


What Summer Is

by girlskylark



Series: This Is Summer [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Fraternity, Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Drugs, Fluff and Angst, Hunk and Lance are frat kiddos, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Lesbian Pidge, M/M, Magical Realism, Pining Keith (Voltron), References to Drugs, Roadtrip, Sad Keith (Voltron), Spoiler alert Lance dies, Suicide, Summer, Synesthesia, Synesthesia Keith, What happened to him, Who even is Lance tbh, Who hurt him, grieving Keith, klangst, whole lotta angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-02
Updated: 2017-04-01
Packaged: 2018-09-27 22:15:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 22
Words: 102,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10053779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girlskylark/pseuds/girlskylark
Summary: Lance’s hand darted out and grabbed him—just like that. And it felt so real and he looked and smelled andwaslike Lance. Keith couldn’t deny how much he missed Lance, but not enough to fall for a goddamn hallucinogenic dream.“Whoa, hey, close one,” Lance laughed. They stared at each other for a solid minute before Lance’s eyes dipped down and turned up again. “Is that… Is that my jacket?”- - -Ever since Lance passed away, Keith has been a mess and can't help but sense that some part of Lance is still with him at all times, and it doesn't help that they never resolved anything between them. So when Lance reappears asking to see his parents, Keith's desperation leads him to help Lance on this cross-country journey if it means getting to patch up whatever the hell happened before Lance died.





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been listening to [this playlist](https://soundcloud.com/user-241898610/sets/interesting) while I wrote this :)

Keith didn’t really like the party scene even though most people associated him with it. Perhaps it was because every time he _did_ happen to go, he wound up running into someone he knew. It wasn’t like he avoided parties anyway, since they just sort of… _found him_. He didn’t quite understand how he ended up here anyway.

But again, maybe that was because his brain went a little hazy between leaving the dorm and ending up at the house party. He was grateful that he actually _knew_ the house though, so it wasn’t hard to find the bathroom and get a fucking grip. 

Keith’s hands braced on either side of the white rim of the sink. He bent down and rubbed water over his face before reaching for the towel dispenser. Frats around here weren’t entirely unlike the dorms. In fact, Keith bargained that they were _worse_ than the dorms because it wasn’t like they had maintenance come by every week to clean up the bathrooms. They just stuffed a paper towel dispenser in here so they wouldn’t have to wash _actual_ towels. 

He rubbed it over his face and it felt like sandpaper against his skin. His bun was falling out, so he tore out the hair tie and was in the midst of redoing it when someone knocked on the door. “Someone’s in here!” Keith shouted over the bass pumping through the floor at his feet.

Evidently, though, he wasn’t the only one who knew the lock on the bathroom door was shit, because the guy just barged right in.

“It’s fine I’ll just be super quick,” the guy said, and Keith just stared at him before realizing the kid was already pissing in the urinal behind him. Unfortunately the mirror managed to slot the stranger up just over Keith’s shoulder. “Nice manbun.”

“Thanks.”

“It really gives you that environmental science major look.”

“Thanks.”

“Wait—so are you an environmental science major?” the guy asked, and Keith rolled his eyes as he finished tying up his bun. 

“ _No_ , and it’s none of your business,” he snapped back. 

Keith turned on his heels and went for the door, but he barely got his hand on the doorknob when he heard the kid hastily zipping up his jeans and saying, “Hey wait! Wait wait wait—”

Keith rolled his eyes, and opened the door a smidgen before propping it open with his foot and saying, “What is it?” The guy was drying off his hands when he strode over to Keith and chucked his towel into the bin. 

His eyes were… _dark_ , darker than his already tanned skin. This kid had the sort of skin tone people spray tanned for, but it was clearly natural, and just a palette under his deep brown hair. The awful bathroom lighting made it appear almost golden on the edges. And Keith regretted not noticing his features sooner.

The smile on this kid’s face was giddy, and clearly influenced by something else. “Hey—I _really_ like your manbun,” he said, leaning in as a sort of _challenge_. Like he expected Keith to fight him on it or just _do something_. 

He all but hesitated as they stared each other down. After a split second of debating it—Keith was always uneasy about asking this—he said, a slight tilt to his head, “What’s your name?”

Asking for a person’s name was always a surprise, but Keith gave up on preconceived notions a _long_ fucking time ago. It wasn’t that it always brought disappointment—it just meant he got to be delightfully surprised whenever an unexpected scent came around. And that was the thing about Keith and people—once a name was tagged to the face, everything about the person became identifiable by their name’s scent. The only name that really seemed neutral to him at all was his own name—Keith came off as the scent and taste of un-mineralized water. 

The guy’s smile only seemed to stretch wider. “The name’s Lance. And you?”

It was a subtle shift, and Keith didn’t mind it one bit. So he gave Lance his name, and that was the first time Keith put a name to the aroma of chlorine water. 

  


  


He supposed there had to be something symbolic about the idea of Keith’s own name tasting like the definition of neutral—water—and Lance’s clearly acidic scent. There was nothing wrong with it. It reminded Keith of swimming pools—a sort of nostalgic image to it that he just couldn’t ignore. He couldn’t imagine _why_ Lance smelled like a chlorinated indoor pool. Evidently the kid could barely swim. 

Keith spent enough time with Lance to know as much. Going around, telling people what their names smelled like, didn’t exactly seem like the best way to get on someone’s good side. But it helped in remembering the entirety of someone. Once the scent seeped into them, Keith could never forget them. He remembered his mom incredibly well for someone who he only knew for the first five years of his life. _Mom_ smelled like toast, but it was just his mom. The general population of moms happened to smell like minty toothpaste for reasons Keith didn’t even know.

He couldn’t stop himself from wondering about the correlation between neutrality and acidity.

  


  


_He was…_

“—in my Calc recitation class. We had a group project together once,” a girl said a table down from Keith and Pidge. He was starting to wonder why he ever decided to come to class. _No_ , he wasn’t just _starting_ to wonder. He didn’t even want to get up this morning. Pidge was the one to start calling him relentlessly on his phone until he was too annoyed to laze around all day. 

The group across from them was talking about Lance. Figures. Keith couldn’t seem to escape it all week. “Ha, it was kinda funny. After we got our grades back he got us all into a party at Kappa Sigma,” she said with a giggle. “Lance was sweet.”

“Yeah, it’s weird huh? He was so happy all the time,” someone said, and Keith looked up just to see them shrug and say, voice quieter, “I don’t see why he would have done it. But that’s just me.”

“Depressed, maybe?”

“Aren’t we all though?” they snorted, reaching across the countertop to fetch a razor to finish the grafting of their plant. “College makes us all depressed.” The girl scowled at them and said they should probably get back to work.

Keith couldn’t even concentrate on anything. His mind was blank except for the resonating scent of chlorine in his head. It felt like he was swimming in it. Nothing really happened in swimming pools, especially when he just… went under and tried to stay suspended until his body betrayed him and lifted him up.

He felt like shit, and not just because Pidge ended up doing most of the experiment data calculations for him. Everything he read was like a textbook—an entire paragraph couldn’t even seem to stick to his brain for more than a second. Copying down her answers was even a task, and it didn’t help that he knew she only pitied him. 

Pidge had the artificial scent of sour Skittles. It was the sort of taste Keith forced himself to get used to—but _actually_ eating sour Skittles was an entirely different story. He had weak tastebuds in reality, which always came to a surprise to people who met him and actually got to _know_ him. There were very few of those people up and about these days. 

But somehow, everything was overshadowed by the ghost of chlorine absolutely _everywhere_. So it barely registered that Pidge was with him as they exited class together. 

“Hey—” she started, tugging him by the arm to make him slow down. He breathed in sharply and glared at her, sidestepping a group of people walking behind them. Pidge glanced after them before turning her doe eyes over to him, the hint her contacts contrasting blue against the redness of her eyes. “I know you don’t like to talk about it. But _seriously_ , are you okay? Like, I’m _pretty sure_ the professors would understand if you just _said something_. Then maybe people would stop bringing it up.”

“It’s _fine_ , Pidge,” he hissed out, lips screwing up at the bitter taste on his tongue. He grimaced a little, pulling a hand up to tug at his hair. “It’s not like I have any _right_ to be acting like— _fuck_ , I just don’t want to think about it let alone _talk_ about it.”

“Sorry for bringing it up,” she muttered, quickly adding, “but I’m just worried. About you. I guess.”

She shrugged, her sweatshirt hood tugging up to her rounded cheeks. Keith pursed his lips, and realized that his forehead felt tight. Stress was starting to draw lines between his brows now. “Don’t be,” he said, forcing his voice to stay calm. He sighed lightly and mimicked her shrug. “Where’re you heading? I’ll walk you there.”

A small smile came to her face. Even if they both knew he was just trying to act normal for her, the sentiment was enough for Pidge. They wandered out the front door of the horticulture lab building together, and Keith found it strange that he could remember a time where he didn’t even know that “Lance” smelled like summer to him. He could remember how ridiculous that entire conversation was with Lance—before Keith knew his name, before anything ever happened. 

Lance thought he was an environmental science major. He didn’t let up on that joke, especially when Keith decided to take horticulture to cover his biology Gen. Ed. Keith couldn’t really smile about it anymore, but the thought was nice. It felt nice, smelled nice, and _was_ nice.

But still, he had no right to feel like this. They were just… roommates after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHY DO I KEEP DOING THIS TO MYSELF.
> 
> So chromesthesia was the biggest winner on the survey, but I know an artist has already made a comic of a chromesthesia Keith, and I think with all the color it'd look best in comic form. So here were are. Keith can smell faces. What a concept. (It's a bit more complicated than that BUT WE'LL GET INTO THAT LATER).
> 
>  **TELL ME WHAT YOUR FAVORITE/LEAST FAVORITE SMELL/TASTE IS** because I'm making a list.


	2. The Basics

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Frat party = Coffee = Roommates ???

“Get some sleep. Don’t drink coffee,” Pidge chastised him. He sighed again—it was starting to become a habit of his. To sigh. His brother would definitely call that a method of soul extraction. Trying to leave reality, or something like that.

His brother had a lot of weird ideas now that he thought about it.

“Aye aye, captain,” Keith jested, saluting her lazily. He dropped his hand against his thigh, defeated as Pidge gave him an annoyed, unamused look. “Fine, fine, no coffee. I’ll try to sleep. Are you coming over tonight? I think Hunk said he was going to try and visit, otherwise I’m just gonna… head over there.”

“As if I’d join you on a march to the sob-fest,” Pidge criticized, frowning at him. “You need to stop going over to Kappa Sigma. It just makes you… Not. You.” They both cringed a little at that, but Pidge shook it off fast enough to say, “If anything get Hunk out of there. I’m gonna eat before going though. So I’ll see you at… six? Maybe?”

“Sure,” Keith agreed. They said their goodbyes before Keith finally left her at the steps of her next lecture building. He stepped away from it until her curly brunette hair disappeared behind the oak doors. She didn’t turn back to see him wave.

So Keith spun back around and faced the road with yet another sigh. His thoughts started to cloud with chlorine again—like the heavy, humid mist wall that he used to walk through to enter the indoor pool. He wondered if there was any correlation to Keith’s initial love of swimming, and the fact that Lance—

 _No_.

He scrubbed a hand over his bleary red eyes and looked down at his phone. He pulled out his [h](https://soundcloud.com/thefabulousshireboys/05-track-05)eadphones and slipped them over his ears. It was something his brother suggested—the only person other than himself who was aware of his… confused senses—but there was definitely something about old fashioned music that really helped him. Maybe it was just the songs that were about a girl—repeating her name—drowning out the scent of chlorine in his nose by singing “ _Sweeet Caroliiine, BAH BAH BAH!_ ” just to smell the golden hue of dandelions under his nose. 

He wouldn’t exactly call it a breath of fresh air, but _damn_ , it was definitely one way to clear his head.

Getting home meant cutting through the entirity of campus. But “home” wasn’t really home anymore, was it? He couldn’t stand the ghost in the room—or lack thereof. With Lance… _no longer around_ , he managed to leave a huge part of himself behind without even meaning to. _So much for trying to cut all his ties_ , Keith always thought. It worked for a split second there, but Keith hated to think of it. 

For almost five days Keith had no notion of Lance at all. There was nothing to the name. It was just… neutral, like water. But that was just for five days. He spent all those days over at Pidge’s dorm. She was a freshmen, and they met in a seminar the previous semester and got on well enough to agree to be lab partners in their Gen. Ed. course. Keith spent one of those nights at Hunk’s, and it was fine, but they just weren’t _that_ great of friends. Lance was always better friends with Hunk.

And perhaps Keith was jealous of Hunk because of that detail.

So Keith ignored everything Pidge said—well, _almost_ everything—and stopped by the coffee shop next-door to his apartment building. It was small and condensed with minimal seating, so he didn’t plan to spend much of his time there considering there wasn’t much room to fit him anyway. The walls were layered in rustic wooden planks, and decorated with old-fashioned photographs of the area. As Keith waited for his coffee, he stared at them, and the black and white street photography patchworked over the planks. The front window filtered in pure white light, and the place smelled like coffee grinds and vanilla syrup. Whenever a customer’s name was called, Keith managed to push chlorine farther and farther back into his mind. He was thankful Lance was an uncommon name.

“Keith?” the barista called out, and he recognized her voice, and the way it was laced with spicy ginger tea. It seemed to be a coincidence that her scent had at least _something_ to do with her occupation. “How are you?” Nyma asked, sliding his coffee across the counter.

He took it up and smelled it briefly before answering. “I’m fine,” he said, plastic smile and all. 

For such a huge school, word about Lance seemed to travel fast because Nyma didn’t buy anything he just put out there. Instead, her wide eyes fixated on him, as if just _waiting_ for him to crack. As if he would do that in public. “Whatever you say…” she drawled in a sing-song voice. “Let me know if you ever need anything, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Next coffee’s on me.”

“You don’t have to…”

“I _want_ to. Besides, it’s not every day I get to see you around,” she said with a wink. He rolled his eyes at that, refusing to blush under the attention. He hated the attention. Perhaps that was the reason why he refused to do what Pidge said and ask the professors to tell everyone to lay off the topic. Just the stigma of it, and how everyone would _look at him differently_ felt wrong. 

He didn’t have the right to feel differently now that Lance wasn’t here. 

“If I did see you everyday, I would wonder what the hell I’m doing with all my money and why it isn’t going towards my tuition,” he confessed, and she was so startled she laughed so loud, the customers next to Keith jumped a little.

“Ah! Haha, that was a good one. I’ll see you around, Keith! Have a nice day!” she said, waving to him before heading off to the start on the next order.

Keith left the coffee shop more or less drained, and listening to a hint of hot printer paper. “Billie Jean” didn’t exactly have an _actual_ connection to steaming hot printer paper, but Keith could live with it. It made him feel warm inside, like he could hold a stack of freshly printed paper to his chest, and let it seep in to all his cold, hard edges. But the weather was nice, so it wasn’t a matter of warding off the chill. 

It was spring—nearly summer—and Keith would just have to survive finals before he wouldn’t have to even look towards his apartment building again. He had absolutely _no plans_ of living there next year after everything that happened. He canceled his lease for the next upcoming year and planned to live with Pidge elsewhere, since it’d be her first apartment and all that business. 

Hunk wasn’t exactly on board with living with them. He had his life set up in his fraternity now—a room to himself, a social life, and (essentially) a future. And unlike Lance, Hunk’s family had enough money to provide for the costs that came with living at a frat house. 

Lance was always bitter about that.

 _Dammit_. 

Keith turned up the volume on his Michael Jackson album. 

  


  


When Keith first met Lance, he was at a house party. It never really processed how, or when he got there, but at some point it was eleven at night and Lance was pushing him down the stairs to the basement of the house where the party was going on. Midway down Lance was stopped by a girl in pumps and teased hair, but he waved her off saying, “I’m busy right now! I’ll talk to you later, I _promise_.”

Keith couldn’t help but snicker at the way the girl scowled at him at that moment, the red light flickering blue for a split second, and vibrating around the horribly patterned wallpaper. There was some awful wood paneling here and there in the house, and it followed all the way down to the basement where Lance spun to him and said, “You like to dance right? Who am I kidding! Of course you do—come here—”

—And so that’s how it happened. They blended into the crowd, melting between sweaty bodies and pulling together people they knew, people they didn’t know, and _dancing_. Keith could see Lance across the circle rolling up the sleeves on his shirt as he swayed to the beat, forehead glistening, the dim light darkening his hair significantly. He looked different outside of the terrible yellow bathroom lighting, and was a force to be reckoned with on the dance floor.

Keith laughed when Lance shimmied across the circle to him, spinning him, and strutting into a pose. He jabbed his finger out to Keith and said, “I challenge you to a dance off.”

Keith snorted and said, “A _what_?” 

“You heard him!” one of the girls shouted, and giggles erupted around the circle as Keith’s already flushed-face turned an even darker shade of red.

“What, you too chicken?” Lance accused, sensually swaying his hips, just to give Keith a taste of what he was capable of. 

Keith’s eyes narrowed, and he reached over to bunch up the sleeves on his shirt. Someone from the sidelines _ooh_ ed and it cracked a smirk on Keith’s lips. “All right. You’re on, pretty boy,” Keith challenged, his grin only growing when the lights flickered pinkish, and washed over Lance’s startled expression. He clearly hadn’t expected Keith to agree to it. 

They danced for _hours_ it felt like, until Keith was sure the back of his shirt was soaked through in sweat, and all the alcohol in his system vanished. He was starting to get sluggish, and he lost sight of Lance for a while, but the kid always came back. Lance always came back.

In the middle of a line dance—something like the Electric Slide—Keith felt someone’s hand skim around his lower back, and then he was pulled to a halt, Lance crossing in front of him. He leant in and said, “I’m kinda beat. I’m gonna head up—you wanna join me?”

The implication didn’t exactly register until Keith was already halfway up the stairs. He was just a freshmen. How old was this kid? Keith just assumed nowadays that anyone could be anything. Lance could have been a _senior_ or something—he could be _a part_ of this frat house. It all just sort of suggested it, anyway—the idea that he had his own room in this house hardly processed until they passed the first floor and went up to the second. 

And Keith was _way_ too sober for this.

“Whoa, hey—I’m not—” Keith started, faltering on the creaky wooden steps. Lance looked down at him, resting a hand on the railing and causing Keith to stutter uselessly. He cleared his throat and said, “Uh… I mean—where are we going…? Exactly?”

“Just the balcony,” he said, and Keith discretely let out a breath of relief. He swore he heard Lance chuckle a little, but it all just faded when they reached the second floor. There were people up and about here, sitting on the floor, saying “Hey!” to them as they passed. Keith only recognized a few based on his past experiences at this same house, and vaguely picked up on their scents. Cheetos… Copper… Roasted corn…

And suddenly they were out on a screened in porch connected to the balcony. Keith always saw this from outside, when he walked down Frat Row—where all the fraternities were stationed. There were coolers out in front of the rugged couch on the porch, where a couple of people were gathered chatting. The scent of cigarette smoke came to him, and after a split second Keith realized it was _actual_ cigarette smoke—not just the implication of it. 

Lance went to one of the coolers, telling one of the guys to shoo off of it. He thanked them, stealing away with two bottles of water, and followed Keith out onto the balcony.

It was spring. It was always cool at night, but it was refreshing when his skin felt sticky and his chest was still humming from the excitement. Lance nudged the water bottle over to him, so he took it and chugged half of it without taking a breath. It wasn’t until he finished that he realized that Lance was watching him the entire time. “What?” he asked.

Lance blinked for a second, laughing, “Nothing. You just… never mind.”

“Seriously, what is it?” Keith said, his amusement showing through in his grin. 

Lance refused to say anything on the matter, so they dropped it. Keith leaned over the ledge of the balcony and looked down at the sidewalk below. There were people mingling out on the short lawn, and Keith was just observing the peculiar couch on the grass when Lance said, “Okay. Let’s get over the basics. Major, where you’re from, what year you’re in.”

“Fair enough. Pre-law, California, and I’m a freshmen,” Keith said, and laughed when Lance quirked an eyebrow at him. “What?” he demanded.

“Sorry, I’m just super caught up on the fact that you’re from _California!_ ” he gawked, and Keith shook his head, smiling all the same. “Wow. Where?”

“Oakland. It’s _really_ close to San Francisco,” he explained, and shrugged a little, “but I say California even though I moved to the suburbs before applying here. So technically here, but originally Oakland.”

“Why would you move to _the Midwest_?” Lance laughed. “Like, I love Minnesota, but why does the weather have to be like this? It’s basically _summer_ and it’s _cold outside!_ ” 

Keith snorted and shook his head, saying that he didn’t know, but that “I moved here so I wouldn’t have to pay out of state tuition. It was my dad’s idea. He misses his hometown and all that shit.”

“Aw, cute.”

His eyes narrowed at Lance and said, “Um, not really. But what about you?”

At this, Lance hopped up and perched himself on the balcony ledge, even though it made Keith’s heart practically leap out of his chest. As if heights didn’t already make him nervous enough. But Lance was perfectly at ease up there, leaning on the hand closest to Keith so he could say, “Well… Originally from Appleton—Go Green Bay Packers—and… hm, well I’m kind of undecided, but mainly going for mechanical engineering. Oh, and I’m also a freshmen.”

Keith didn’t want to admit it, but he was forever grateful that Lance wasn’t an upperclassman. So he just said, “Oh, cool. Why mechanical engineering?”

“I like building _stuff_ , and calc is just sort of my thing. And I also want to help the environment hence all my friends at the _forensic sciences frat_. So I’m thinking about those really cool rigs they put in the ocean that clean up all the oil and I just find that _fascinating_. But the ocean scares the hell out of me, so maybe not that…” he confessed, pinching a finger to his lips as he thought harder on it.

“Why does it scare you?” he asked, bumping his hip against Lance’s knee to get his attention again.

“Well, it’s so mysterious. And we’ve lived on this planet for _how long?_ And we know next to nothing about the largest fucking portion of it? Like, imagine all the potential, but _still_. It scares me almost as much as space does. You know that ninety percent of space is just… _space?_ Like, how scary would it be to get stranded out there! No one’s coming for you!” he exclaimed, throwing his arms up suddenly and nearly whacking Keith right in the face. “Oh God, sorry! Sorry, did I hit you?”

“No, no,” Keith laughed, brushing aside Lance’s hands when they came to cradle his face. “I’m fine! Seriously, don’t worry about it,” he insisted, smiling almost giddily at all this attention he was getting. He couldn’t believe he came _this close_ to letting Lance cradle his fucking face. He wondered just how soft Lance’s fingers were.

“Okay, good. But I still feel guilty,” he announced, clasping his hand to Keith’s shoulder and giving him a good shake. “Tell ya what—you, me, coffee tomorrow afternoon to make up for it. And also I say the afternoon because I know for a _fact_ that I’ll be sleeping in ‘till noon.”

Keith was too surprised to even say no to it. He was glad he didn’t, though, because hanging out with Lance was just so… _easy_. And it helped that neither of them were incredibly hung over the following afternoon, despite the reddish appearance to Keith’s eyes, and the tousled look of Lance’s hair. It was easy to sit and talk to Lance for over and hour about anything and everything. He never knew just _talking_ would be so smooth and stress-free. 

They went to the coffee shop by Keith’s future apartment— _their_ future apartment. It was still as small as usual, and Keith got there early enough to claim a spot by the windows and keep it until Lance came sauntering across his vision, only to skid to a halt and backtrack to wave at Keith through the window. Keith looked up over the edge of his laptop and gave him a, “What the hell are you doing?” look followed by a hesitant wave back.

So Lance bought them each a drink and slid into the seat next to him. After an hour or so of talking, they got on the topic of housing for the following year. “Yeah, I had something planned with my roommate, but turns out he’s transferring to Madison next fall so—”

“ _Bleh_ , _Madison_. And I come from _Wisconsin_ ,” Lance said, sticking his tongue out. “Why Madison?”

Keith shrugged and admitted, “I dunno. I think he always wanted to get into Madison but his grades were too low. They take transfers easier than straight up applications I guess. So he came here.”

“What a problematic kid,” Lance muttered, swirling the bottom of his mug against the saucer before saying, “So where are you living?”

“Literally right next door to here,” he said, nodding to the left. “Stairway goes up to the second floor, and that’s where I’ll be with two other guys. But they get their own room, I get mine. But rent’s gonna spike for me because I’m not sharing a room anymore.”

“That sucks,” Lance commented with an apologetic sneer at the economy. “Yeah… I had plans to move into Kappa Sigma, ‘cause my buddy Hunk got in and all, but it’s too expensive. As if being in the frat to begin with isn’t already a fortune…”

“So… what were you thinking for the fall?” Keith asked, even though his chest seemed to tighten at the thought of it. He wondered if Lance was on the same page as him, or if he was just hallucinating or something. Because Lance was turning all depressed like some sad puppy, big doe eyes reminding him of Pidge when she would beg him to help her study. 

“Well… I _was_ thinking about that apartment complex on the way other side of campus. It’s the cheapest one I think—”

“True, but it’s the suckiest one,” Keith said, leaning his arm back against his chair rest. “And you also have to pay for all the utilities. My brother lived around here before the rest of my family did, and he actually lived above this coffee shop when he went to school here. So he vouched for me and the others and swung us a lower rent—utilities already included.”

“Seriously?” Lance gawked. “Wait—your brother went here?”

“For grad school, yeah—”

“Wait, but you don’t have a roommate,” he clarified, as if that was what he initially meant to ask. Almost instantly his face turned a bit pink and he said, “Sorry, it’s just—I mean, you don’t _have_ to if you don’t _want_ to—”

“You want to live with me?” Keith asked, and neither of them seemed to want to admit it until Keith’s high-and-mighty attitude led Lance to cave. Keith broke down laughing, saying that he’d be happy to talk to his landlord. That they could figure it out that same day. 

They actually ended up… spending the _entire_ day together, which was just a surprise. Keith couldn’t help but feel like after so long he’d get worn out by constant conversation, or even just the smell of chlorine, but it was subtle, and Lance kept up most of the talking. Since they were over the basics of who they were, they went on to the topic of I-swear-I’m-not-a-serial-killer, and also living habits. 

“You should know that Hunk and I aren’t… great roommates,” Lance confessed with a grimace. “He’s, like, my _childhood best friend_ , but it just hasn’t been working out. So I mean… I don’t _mind_ spending a lot of time outside the room so if you get annoyed with me or anything just tell me—”

“Dude, you’re _paying_ to live there, I’m not gonna force you to leave,” Keith said with a slight laugh. “Why don’t you and Hunk get along? If you guys are best friends?”

“I don’t know. We have different music tastes, and our sleeping schedules never synched, and he’s, like, a _really_ loud snorer. And I mean, I’d be cool with that! but I have sleep problems and it’s annoying when I finally get to sleep only to be woken up by him snoring. And—wait, you don’t… you don’t snore, do you?”

Keith shook his head, and Lance let out a sigh of relief. “Okay good. So I’ve been sleeping at my friend’s place a lot. She’s a sophomore and has an apartment way out of the way. But she makes me _tea_ and we watch _Netflix together_ and then I just crash on her couch and it’s all good. Her roommates are super chill too—I met them through Kappa Sigma.”

“Of course you did,” Keith laughed. “What’s your sleep schedule like? It can’t be as bad as mine.”

Lance gave him a look that said, “Try me,” before explaining the horrible symptoms of what might have been insomnia, but Keith was never too sure about it himself because he never got his own issues checked out by a professional. In the end, Lance flung his arm over Keith’s shoulders and announced that they could “suffer together and be the greatest roommates possible!”

 _So… we were just roommates, I guess_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Idk if I'm gonna post tomorrow ?? I'm not as far ahead in this as I was in my last novel, so if I post tomorrow it'll be because I caught up to where I should be. Which definitely doesn't include ALL THE HOMEWORK I NEED TO DO D:
> 
> [Fight me](http://gurlskylark.tumblr.com/) if you dare. **Also, I'm still adding stuff to my scent/taste list!** So feel free to holler at me.


	3. Lack of the Elephant

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance's jacket. That is all.

His room of the apartment was bland and unnerving. He hated the smell of it. It smelled like him—neutral, watered down, trying to cover up the fact that _no one else lived there anymore_. No one occupied this room except for him. 

Before college, he never really considered himself much of a homebody, or someone who _liked_ to have people around. But that just wasn’t the case anymore, and when he thought on it, it just _wasn’t_ the case at any point in time. He was convinced that throughout high school he spent so much time in their family room that it just never really processed that he was there specifically to be near his brother, or his adopted mom and dad. 

Being home alone always unnerved him as well. It was why his entire room was unnerving. Lance was always around—he hadn’t been exaggerating with that bit—and Keith didn’t mind it at all. They spent a _lot_ of time together. He probably spent more time with Lance than he ever did with Pidge or his old roommate combined. It helped that their schedules were almost perfectly aligned as well. Of course, they were always on different ends of campus, but at least when Lance got home, Keith was just getting through the door.

They lived in their own little world together, only associating with the other guys if necessary. But Keith never really bothered to get to know them because one of them smelled like socks—but not gym socks, just _socks_. It took forever for Keith to peg what the name “Michael” meant, but it always unsettled him until the day he ripped off his socks after not changing them for a few days, and took a big whiff of it. Yup. That was Michael. There was also alfredo sauce John, Michael’s roommate who was more or less a cryptid considering how little Keith saw of him.

Keith dropped his backpack to the ground at his feet with a low groan—it might even be mistaken for despair. The door clicked shut behind him, so he shuffled his backpack over to the wall and went to his bed. He set his half-empty coffee on the table and collapsed face-first into his empty bed. It was off to the far side of the room—the only side of the room that still had furniture in it.

  


  


He remembered when Lance’s family came to pick up everything. After the funeral. Keith was always on good terms with Lance’s mom, Ramira, but after the whole affair she could barely set foot in the apartment. Lance’s dad and older brother took care of moving out the bed and stuff while Keith went down the steps to meet up with Ramira and Lance’s Aunt Amara. They were folding up Lance’s clothes on the open back of the truck and placing them into neat boxes. 

Keith never said anything. He felt like they probably had enough of the “I’m sorry for your loss” bullshit, and he wasn’t much for formalities. So he just helped load in boxes of clothes into the back of the truck to make room for the bed frame and such. Before Lance’s dad and brother could come back down with it, Ramira turned to him and said, “Let me take you out for coffee. I want to talk to you for a while.”

Keith stood there for a moment and glanced over at Lance’s aunt. The woman looked at him from over the edge of the truck bed and gave a shrug. “Amara, can you help with loading the mattress?” Ramira asked, and the woman agreed to it. 

In all honesty, Keith didn’t really want to stick around Lance’s family. He loved them, sure, but… what was he supposed to say without Lance there? What was he supposed to do, how was he supposed to act? He’d never spoken with Ramira without Lance as a buffer. And with Lance all over his thoughts he couldn’t stop thinking, _believing_ , that Lance was standing right next to him smelling of swimming pools and acting like everything was okay in the world.

Before they could leave, though, Ramira stopped Keith and said, “Hold on—it’s a bit chilly out, don’t you want to grab a jacket?” 

“No, I’m fine in this,” he confessed, tugging on the sleeves of his shirt. It was the transition into summer. Some days were colder than others—that was just the midwestern style of weather.

Ramira _tsk_ ed him, and went to the back of the truck where the boxes were. “I want you to keep something of Lance’s—he’d want that,” she told him sternly, and he was surprised by how firm she was in saying it. How could she say that without her voice shaking?

Ramira was one of the strongest individuals Keith knew, next to Lance.

“Oh, no, you don’t have to. You guys should keep his things, not me,” Keith said quickly, shaking his head, but she was already yanking up the folds of one of the cardboard boxes. 

Aunt Amara came up beside Keith and leant against the truck, nudging him with her elbow and saying, “Just let her. If she asks for it back then you can just mail it to us.”

Keith’s cheeks went red, and he really, _really_ didn’t want anything of Lance’s. With the way they left things, Keith wasn’t sure anything Ramira said about Lance liking him so much was ever really true. Nothing about Lance seemed true now, because he never expected… _this_ to happen.

Lance’s aunt slapped Keith on the back and rolled her eyes. “Besides, what are we going to do with all this anyway? Aside from make hand-me-downs out of it?”

Keith was silent as usual, but it unnerved him. It made sense to get use out of Lance’s clothes and such, but it hurt nonetheless. No one else was supposed to wear these things, let alone throw them to Keith from the back of the truck and expect _him_ to put it on just because it was a bit chilly out. Keith held it up and took note of it quickly, saying, “This was one of his favorites. You guys should keep this—”

“He’d want you to have it,” Lance’s mom said, smiling down at him before hopping off the truck bed. 

She nodded off to where they’d walk—to Starbucks, probably, because if Keith knew anything about Lance’s mom, it was that she had a knack for scouting out familiar names in places that _weren’t_ Appleton. They walked side-by-side as Keith hesitantly shrugged on Lance’s jacket. It was baggy of Lance to begin with, so Keith wasn’t much different. It was warm and smelled like cologne. _So this is what Lance_ actually _smelt like on a daily basis?_ Keith mused, nudging his chin against the shoulder of it and taking a whiff of it.

“He always wore that ratty thing,” Ramira commented, shaking her head. “I swear it was the exact same thing he wore every time he came to visit on holidays. That and his backpack. I’m surprised he didn’t take it this time around… Do you want his backpack? It’s still in good condition I think.”

“No, no. I’m fine, thanks,” Keith said, startled by the offer. Ramira pinched her fingers to her lip, turning away with a little hum. He wondered if giving away Lance’s things would end up being a coping mechanism for her. “How’s… um, how is everything, though?” he asked awkwardly.

“Busy. Just… very, _very_ busy,” she said, and after a moment, she sidled up next to him and slung her arm around his torso, giving him a squeeze. “I just want you to know that you did everything right. You were the perfect fit for Lance. Last year was… stressful for him,” she told him. 

His eyes felt puffy, and he couldn’t quite trust his own voice so he didn’t say anything. 

“I’m glad you and Lance were such great friends. And if you ever need anything, let me know. We’d love to have you over as well—when you came over Christmas, the kids _loved_ you. There’s nothing more intriguing than someone who acts like they don’t care,” she said, and he laughed a little. That would explain why kids loved him when he hated them. 

“Thanks. I’d… honestly love to go to Appleton again,” he confessed, and smiled until he heard Ramira take in a big breath. She had something to say. “What is it?”

“Well… That’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” she said, her hand rubbing up and down his back in a motherly fashion. It was something he almost always associated with mint toothpaste for Lance’s mom, but Ramira was just simply… the bitter scent of dark chocolate. Nothing was particularly repellant about Ramira’s name scent, and he reflected it with her. Dark chocolate fit the heavy density of her dark hair, and the milk chocolate texture of her skin.

“We won’t be in Appleton by the end of next month,” she said, and it didn’t fully process until Ramira started talking again to fill in the silence. “We’ll be moving to the West Coast. I’ve always wanted to live there—and you said you always loved California, but Greg and I are thinking more north because we never really liked scorching hot weather. And with Lance no longer with us… I just… Appleton just has bad memories now. So I wanted—I wanted to _let you know_ , in case you ever wanted to visit us in Oregon.”

Her voice got choked up in the middle there, and _shit_ whenever someone near him sounded like they were crying, he felt the urge to do the same. He never considered himself a particularly empathetic individual, but with Ramira he just couldn’t help it. “You’re… moving to _Oregon_?” he asked, brow tensing over his burning eyes. 

They were approaching the Starbucks store front, and Keith could see the glowing white sign over the brick exterior. He paused outside the door, even when Ramira held it open for him. “Why are you moving?” he asked. “Appleton is _great_ —and _Wisconsin—_ ”

She gave him a pitying look, as if, of _course_ Keith wouldn’t understand. He never experienced loss like them, and she was _right_. It made Keith feel like shit for feeling like shit. He had no _right_ to be acting like this. The McClains had to cope somehow, and if that meant moving across the country then he had no reason to doubt them, or argue with them. 

The truth of the matter was this: Ramira lost her son. Keith just… lost a roommate.

“I’m sorry, Keith. And I know Appleton’s great, but we’ve lived there ever since Lance was born. And he’s my baby boy—everything there… reminds me of him. It’d just—it would be nice to get a fresh start,” she confessed, biting down on her lower lip as Keith finally gave in and stepped through the open door. They waited in line for a moment in silence before Ramira turned to him and said, “Lance always said you liked Starbuck’s frappucinos. So I think I might get one of those if you do.”

Keith laughed a little, but his throat closed up and he asked, almost hysterical, “He said that?” 

Why the hell was he getting emotional over Lance’s memory of him. Lance wasn’t supposed to remember little things like what the hell Keith ordered at Starbucks on the rare occasions they went there. Lance wasn’t supposed to tell his _mom_ what Keith liked to get at Starbucks. Lance wasn’t supposed to do any of that because _they were just roommates_.

He pushed the sleeves of Lance’s jacket to his already burning eye sockets and took in a deep breath to calm down. Ramira put her arm around him again, followed by another, and then they were hugging in the middle of the goddamn university Starbucks line crying over frappucinos and the fact that Lance fucking committed suicide and Ramira was there saying Keith had nothing to do with it even though he spent an entire year so close to Lance and he never even _knew Lance was capable of doing it_ —

  


  


“I heard him come in about an hour ago? He’s probably in his room,” Michael was saying from out in the living room. Keith’s eyes were crusty so he rubbed at them and scrubbed off dried tears from the corner of his eyes with the edge of Lance’s jacket sleeve. It was more like a heavy-duty sweatshirt than anything, and even if Keith tried not to think of Lance, it certainly didn’t stop him from wearing Lance’s janky jacket everywhere in the apartment. 

So when Hunk and Pidge came in, they found Keith sitting up in his bed, curved over his now-cold coffee, dwarfed by the oversized jacket, and trying to hide his bloodshot, tired eyes from them. “Hey guys,” he said, looking up only briefly.

He did a double-take and realized that they had… cake? 

Hunk was there holding it up like some sort of prize. He was a pretty big guy as well, and the box took up the width of his bulky chest, and rested on his solid forearms. The elegant white box contrasted against his dark skin, and complimented his brilliant smile. “We have chocolate cake!” he announced.

Keith slid his legs off the end of his bed, and reached out for the box, lazily as always. Hunk marched over and bestowed it to him, bending a knee and everything. He laughed a little—Hunk was always a bit extravagant in everything he did. Hunk _did_ happen to bring a cake over, anyway, and Keith considered that to be a bit extra.

Hunk and Pidge were a good combination, not just because they were like Ferra/Torr from _Mortal Kombat_ , but because their scents matched well in a way Keith couldn’t quite comprehend. Hunk’s scent happened to manifest in more of a taste than anything because pineapples didn’t have that prominent of a scent. And with the artificial fruity flavors of Pidge’s Skittles, Hunk fit in well with that conglomeration. Together they smelled like Froot Loops, and that was a scent Keith could live with.

Pidge hopped up onto the bed next to Keith, saying, “We were walkin’ past that place where all the sororities do charity stuff, and they were selling cakes. Good stuff, right?” 

“Yeah, good shit,” he agreed, smirking as he laid the box down and flipped open the top.

All three of them oogled at the sight of it—just sitting there in all its chocolatey glory. Just looking at it made Keith’s mouth water before he realized that it looked like dark chocolate. Dark chocolate made him think of Lance’s mom. 

“Mind if I raid your kitchen? I didn’t bring plates or forks with me,” Hunk said, and Keith waved his hand as a way of saying, “Go for it, dude.”

Hunk bounded off and left Pidge and Keith to marvel at the cake before Keith asked, “How much did this cost?”

“Don’t even worry about it,” she said, nudging him in the arm. “Hunk said it was his treat. His parents gave him a crazy three hundred dollar VISA to make up for the fact that they didn’t let him come home for Lance’s funeral. ‘Cause, you know, finals are coming up and stuff.”

Yeah… that was a touchy subject. Hunk had a breakdown a few days before Ramira and Greg McClain came to the university to pick up Lance’s things, when the funeral was going on. He could have bought his own ticket on a bus and swung over to Appleton, but his mother regulated his funds and practically threatened to sabotage his summer internship. Evidently Hunk believed she had the power to do such things, which honestly pissed Keith off to no end. 

He still boiled over it every now and then. Even if he didn’t even go, he at least hoped Hunk would be able to. And Ramira had been so nice about calling Keith and letting him know that he would always have a place in Appleton to stay at if he happened to come by for Lance’s funeral. It just seemed like one big sob fest, but evidently the McClains liked to keep their shit together during these times. He couldn’t imagine the tension in that household right now, though. 

The tension during the drive to the university must have been as dense as concrete.

Hunk returned and they all piled onto the bed because they all refused to sit on the floor. “Okay, so we’re gonna split this into three pieces,” he said, and Pidge gasped a little.

“It’d still be the size of my head!”

“I know, that’s why we’ll each take a piece home,” Hunk explained, ever the rational one. 

“But Michael’s here, right? Give him a piece,” Keith suggested, and after debating it and a bit of yelling going along the lines of, “But it’s our friendship cake—!” Hunk relented and divided the cake up into four (the fourth one being a bit smaller than the others) and left to deliver it to Michael. Michael’s roommate John wasn’t around to reap the benefits of Hunk’s (reluctant) generosity.

They all seemed to stare at the empty spot in the room—and if there was an elephant in the room, Keith was certain they would all see it. But there was just… nothing.

“There’s a party on Friday,” Hunk said, licking the tongs of his fork before adding, “You know, end of the year blow-out bash. Before Finals Week.”

“Don’t remind me,” Pidge groaned, sticking her tongue out. “I’m just glad we don’t have anymore labs in horticulture. I thought I’d _like_ plants, but apparently they don’t like me.”

“What are you talking about? You’re doing fine in horticulture,” Keith commented, raising his eyebrows at her as if daring her to argue with him. She pursed her lips at him, glaring menacingly from beneath her heavy brown bangs.

“You aren’t wrong. But I don’t happen to consider a ninety-two percent as ‘fine,’” she said, crossing her arms defiantly, turning her head away. “Besides, what about you? You must be a plant genius or something.”

“Am not.”

“You’ve been zoning out all week and somehow you end up with perfect marks on your lab quizzes. How does that happen?” she demanded, throwing her arms up in annoyance.

In all honesty, some words happened to have a hint of something extra to them that Keith noticed once in a while. Not _all_ words were a storm of contradicting scents—otherwise he would _hate_ reading novels—but some just happened to have greater connotations to them. It just so happened that some of the terms in horticulture had a hint of something related to drying paint, maybe a bit of dryer sheets, and one of them smelled like orange. 

So in that sense, yes, studying was easy when he just had to smell the right word.

Pidge would think he was insane if she ever knew about it.

“Well… maybe you don’t want to know my secret to success,” he confessed, tapping a finger to his lip. She threw her arms up, screaming that _now_ she wanted to know about it _more than before_. Hunk tipped back on the bed, laughing harder and kicking Keith playfully in the knee. He fought Hunk off with one hand, the other holding his plate of cake up where it couldn’t become a casualty. They screamed and attacked one another, Pidge getting caught into the mix and becoming sandwiched between them—all of Hunk’s weight on top of them.

Keith gasped and Pidge groaned, “I can’t feel my lungs!”

Hunk rolled off them, returning to the cake he abandoned at the windowsill. Pidge lifted herself up from where she now sat between Keith’s legs. He leant back and watched her recover from the attack before he said, “You’re pretty weak, aren’t you?”

Pidge gawked at him and proceeded to punch him _hard_ in the arm. He shrieked a little, rubbing at it as she ranted, “Don’t you dare say such things! I am more hardcore than you—I’ll have you know gymnastics made me buffer than most of the football players in my high school,” she declared, slamming her fist onto the comforter. 

“Gymnasts _are_ pretty intense,” Hunk agreed. “I wouldn’t want to get punched by one of them.”

“ _God_ , I wish you would have told me that _sooner_ ,” Keith whined, tugging Lance’s jacket down a touch just to see the start of a bruise forming there. Pidge giggled at it and reached over to poke it, but he swatted her off. “You _know_ I bruise easily!”

“Yeah, it’s ‘cause you’re pale and pale skin shows bruises more easily,” she said, which just earned her another glare. “Hey! Speaking of bruises—I want to watch a movie.”

“How does that have anything to do with bruises?” Hunk asked, narrowing his eyes at her. “Is it a horror movie?”

“What? No—Why do you associate bruises with horror movies though? That is what I would like to know,” she said as she leaned over the bed to pull up her backpack from the floor. Keith tugged her cake away so it wouldn’t be flattened by it. 

“Bruises make me think of gore and gore makes me think of horror movies,” Hunk confessed, falling forward and digging into his cake for another bite. Keith was very particular about the pieces he severed off on his own slice. He took geometric shapes out, and liked to watch the metal of his fork press into the surface like a balloon, and cut in with relative accuracy. He would then pierce it with the tongs of his fork, and nibble on it as they watched Pidge work on her computer to bring up the movie.

“Well, you guys live such boring lives, watching dude movies like _Die Hard_ or _Rocky Balboa_ ,” she said, and before either of them could argue against it, she continued: “so we’re watching the wonderful world of _Spirited Away_.”

“The _what?_ ” Keith choked a little, glaring at her as he hollered, “I’ve already seen it! I’ve told you my brother’s a big Studio Ghibli fan!”

“Yeah, but how long ago did you see it?” she demanded, challenging him with an equally menacing look. He couldn’t even remember, so he didn’t answer. “Exactly. We’re watching it.”

Keith groaned, and Hunk murmured, “What’s _Spirited Away_?” Pidge shushed him and started the movie before bounding up and closing the curtains in the room.

Lance and Keith used to watch movies all the time. Weird movies. The sort of movies they expected to find at obscure film festivals. Playing in the basement of someone’s house during a party. Screen caps of it on Tumblr for the color aesthetics. Those kinds of indie films. And Keith _knew_ it had only been a little over a week, but he was starting to miss those movie nights, and watching movies with Pidge and Hunk just… weren’t the same.

They stayed for the entirity of the movie, even when Keith fell asleep halfway through with his stomach full of chocolate cake, and body warm from Lance’s cozy jacket. He barely got any sleep at night, and some would call it a miracle that he was even able to sleep with Pidge and Hunk were around, but Keith was more comfortable with people there. He didn’t like sleeping in the room alone at night.

Thankfully, though, he woke up a few minutes before the end of the film so Hunk and Pidge wouldn’t have to feel awkward ditching him after the movie. It was a long one and went into the night a bit, so when Keith saw them out of the apartment, it was dark on the other side of the door. 

“I’ll see you on Friday, right? For the party?” Hunk asked, and Keith nodded. “Okay good. I’m trying to implement a fund thing for the entry fee so that it all goes to Lance’s family and stuff. So it’ll sorta be for him, and I think someone’s planning a speech or somethin’… but I dunno. You could slip in after all that stuff goes down if you want ‘cause… ya know.”

The more Hunk talked the less Keith wanted to go to the party. 

“Yeah, sure. I’ll just come later then,” he said instead with a faint shrug as if to say it didn’t matter either way. “As long as Pidge goes.”

“I dunno…” she whined, swaying on her feet. She had her box of cake held up to her chest. “I mean, finals and stuff…”

“Yeah, but you have the rest of the weekend to study for them,” Hunk argued. “And it’ll be the last Kappa Sigma party, so ya gotta go! Finish your freshmen year with a _bang_ , ya know?”

“Yeah, a bang and some smashed grades. I think I might pass,” she confessed, reaching up to rub one of her eyes. “And I need to sleep so I’ll see you guys later. Bye Keith, bye Hunk.”

She waved to them and started off down the sidewalk in the direction of her dorm. Hunk waved after her saying, “Farewell, my beautiful elf-friend!” She turned around only to flip him off before hurrying across the street before a car could get her. Hunk sighed from beside Keith and said, “You know, she’s pretty cool for a freshmen.”

“I wouldn’t really count her as a freshmen. She has enough credits to be a sophomore,” Keith confessed.

“But she’s the age of a freshmen, isn’t she?”

“No, actually she’s pretty young for her year. She turned seventeen _this year_ ,” he said, and Hunk hummed in realization, as if that made so much more sense. “How much do you seriously know about her?”

Hunk pouted at Keith, saying, “Don’t criticize me. I try my best. It gets difficult to remember everything about everyone. I’ve met more people this year than I have at any other point in my life.” _The definition of college_ , Keith thought. Remembering and forgetting people faster than Keith could say “Hello.”

They stood in silence for a while. Tonight’s temperatures weren’t so bad, so they stood outside the door, next to the coffee shop until Hunk said, “Lance’s jacket looks nice on you. Are you gonna keep it?”

Keith glanced down at it and tugged at the olive-colored fabric. It had a kind of… fuzzy felt texture to it, and the inside was even cozier. “Yeah, I think so,” he confessed. “Ramira gave it to me ‘cause she wanted me to have something of Lance’s.”

“Yeah, she gave me his photo collection. I’m gonna put it all in an album like one of those grandmas who collects pictures of her grandchildren,” he admitted, and Keith laughed a little at the thought. He only faintly remembered Lance’s photo collection. It was something that took up the entirity of his desk drawer. “But anyway, I’ll show it to you when I get around to finishing it. I promised his mom I’d send her a picture of the final product.”

“I’m surprised she didn’t want to keep them,” Keith said. Photos seemed like something people kept and collected for future generations. He hadn’t expected Ramira to just… give them up like that. But then again, Hunk was Lance’s best friend. He was essentially Ramira’s adopted-son in the sense that they spent all their time together in the summer. So… Keith supposed it made sense. 

“Yeah, I’m a bit surprised too. But I dunno. See you on Friday?” Hunk said, holding out his fist to Keith. He bumped his knuckles against Hunk’s, and agreed to the date. Hunk wandered off down the sidewalk, plugging in his earbuds and heading off into the world, taking the pineapple scent with him. Which just left Keith to absorb the chlorine on his skin.

Keith shuffled back up the steps to the apartment, and went straight back to his room to sleep. The bed was still sorta warm where they were all sitting together, so he curled up around it and tossed the blanket over his head. It was stuffy under there, but at least there he could blend out the smell of chlorine with that of whatever dryer sheets he used to clean his comforter.

He spent approximately ten minutes in partial-sleep-mode before registering that he was hearing something in the room. 

It sounded like… someone walking while making every attempt to stay _entirely_ quiet. He couldn’t possibly imagine Michael coming in to check on him—they weren’t even the greatest friends to begin with, so it was just weird that he’d even come into Keith’s room without permission. So Keith groaned and rolled over onto his side, muttering, “ _Get out of my room…_ ”

“Um… excuse me?”

Keith’s eyes blinked open in an instant, and he scowled at that familiar voice on the other side of his blanket wall. This definitely _wasn’t_ Michael.

Keith peered up over the blanket, eyes wide and, quite honestly, _horrified_. 

_I have to be dreaming. I have to be dreaming_ —

Lance was standing in the middle of the room. He was _right. Fucking. There_. His stance was casually confused—hands on his hips and eyes scanning the room before landing on Keith. There was something off about the way he looked, though, and Keith couldn’t quite peg it especially when Lance was walking towards him and sending Keith scrambling back on his bed, blankets up in defense. 

Keith froze, back against the edge of the wall where the windowsill was, watching Lance lean over Keith’s bed and tug on the blanket. Keith yanked on it, and the force of it sent him scrambling on the edge of his mattress. Lance’s hand darted out and grabbed him—just like that. And it felt _so real_ and he looked and smelled and _was_ like Lance. Keith couldn’t deny how much he missed Lance, but not enough to fall for a goddamn hallucinogenic dream.

“Whoa, hey, close one,” Lance laughed. They stared at each other for a solid minute before Lance’s eyes dipped down and turned up again. “Is that… Is that my jacket?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [This song makes me want to take over the world](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9Dg-g7t2l4). But I'd probably take over the world via fanfiction and RIPPING PEOPLES HEARTS OUT (figuratively speaking). David Draiman reminds me of Fisk from Daredevil, but if Fisk was in a screamo/metal band and had a lot of piercings, which is honestly such a concept. Gee wiz.


	4. Theory of a Nightlight

For some odd reason, he hadn’t expected Lance to act… like _Lance_.

“Aw, cute—why haven’t you stolen that before? What, did you raid my closet or something?” Lance asked, the humor in it showing in his sharp-witted smile, and the way he dipped in as if to bop his nose against Keith’s. Keith nearly slammed his head back into the window just to get away from him.

Keith flung himself off the bed and backed away from where… Lance was. He was still trying to process what about Lance made him entirely different from before, but it was weird. It was like… just a week was enough for Keith to completely forget what Lance looked like aside from his scent, and now there was just this echo of him sitting perched on his bed, annoyed with Keith. 

Lance slapped his hands onto the comforter. “Well, I was going to _compliment you_ , but obviously you’re not into it tonight. Also, where the hell is my bed? Did you guys hide it or something?” he asked, bounding off the bed to stand where his mattress used to be, held up by a wooden frame and everything. “Also, that rack of clothes I had—is this a prank? This is totally a prank. You know I hate being pranked—I hate surprises.”

“S-Same,” Keith stammered, eyes narrowing at Lance as he stepped towards his little corner in a weak attempt to avoid anything and everything that involved the damn ghost in his bedroom. 

But Lance was completely solid—he _prevented_ Keith from falling off the bed—

“What are you?” he asked suddenly, still glaring menacingly at Lance as his previous roommate started searching again. He’d been looking for all of his things.

“Doing? I’m just looking for my phone—and literally _everything else I own_. This apartment isn’t big enough to hide a fucking mattress, in case you forgot!” Lance argued, turning for the door. Keith’s brain was working faster than it had all fucking week. If Lance went out the door, and their other flatmates saw him—everyone knew Lance was dead, and seeing a fucking ghost wouldn’t improve anyone’s outlook on this apartment. No one would want to lease it out next semester.

Keith lunged for Lance, sprinting across the room and slamming into him, knocking them both off to the side where Keith’s clothing rack was. They tripped through it and they both slammed into the wall, shoulders burning and heads rattling. Lance cursed loudly, clutching at the side of his head where he bumped it into the wall—one of Keith’s dress shirts was slung over his head and shoulders, and Lance hastily shook it off and shoved Keith off of him.

“What the fuck! Why did you—” Lance exploded, but Keith slapped his hand over Lance’s mouth and looked to the door.

Even across the apartment and in the other room, it wouldn’t be all that hard to hear all that commotion that just happened.

Keith glared at Lance, but his anger fizzled out faster than he intended. It all halted at the sight of… Keith realizing what made this Lance so different from the one he remembered. This Lance was _everything_ chlorine—before it was just a hint of something under the surface, like quiet background music, but now it was _strong_. There wasn’t anything involving the cologne scent Lance normally wore on his clothes, against his neck, shampoo in his hair and contrasting detergent washed with his shirts. This Lance was _only chlorine_ , and not only that, but—

—he was _glowing_.

It was the faintest detail, like backlight catching on the edges of his hair, hinting at the highlights on his cheeks, and where it caught on the delicate, minuscule fuzz of his shirt fabric. Keith stared at where it was most noticeable on Lance’s shirt, and let go of Lance’s mouth to clutch at his shirt and tug at the fabric. 

“What the hell are you looking at? Why are you acting so fucking weird all of a sudden?” Lance demanded, slapping Keith off of him before actually getting a look at his own hand.

He held it up and flipped it over, and brought it close to inspect the little hairs on his hand that caught on the nonexistent blue light. “Whoa, are you seeing this?” he asked, yanking Keith close to look at his fingertips. His index finger had the longest nail, and they could see something glowing through the white crescent. But there was nothing on the other side, nothing inside, it just… was there.

Lance yanked up the sleeve on his shirt and lifted it up to inspect his arm hair. He laughed, looking at Keith and back at his arm. “This is crazy! What is going on…? Am I dreaming? I’ve gotta be dreaming—you wouldn’t bodyslam me into a wall for nothing.”

Keith scowled at him and pulled him out from his clothing rack, ignoring the fact that a few of them fell over. In the light of the room now, they couldn’t really see the glow as well. It was just simply a matter of glowing in the dark. Lance frowned a little, seeing that it disappeared. “Aw, where’d it go?” he whined.

“Seriously?” Keith blurted out. “Do you mind telling me what the hell is going on? Stop— _Stop_ fucking look at your goddamn hand, Jesus Lance this is serious!” He grabbed Lance’s hand roughly and through it down, aggressively shoving Lance by the shoulders. He staggered back a bit, leaning back on his left sock—his socks were mismatched, as always. His jeans were rolled up on the ends, as always. Everything was _as always_ except for the glowing factor. 

And Keith _hated it_.

“I-I don’t understand what’s going on,” Lance confessed. “I was just—”

“What were you doing?” Keith demanded sharply. His heart was beating faster than ever, his brain pushing him to panic, freakout mode incredibly fast. “Before you started rummaging around the room?” 

Lance flickered between both of Keith’s eyes before he shook his head, reaching for his hair. “Um… Well, I forgot my phone and I was just gonna come and grab it before heading back to—back to—huh, where _did_ I come from? Maybe I was at Hunk’s—”

“ _No_ , you _weren’t_ ,” Keith hissed before he could stop it, his already burning eyes blurring over faster than ever. He couldn’t see for shit in a matter of seconds. “You _weren’t_ at Hunk’s! You weren’t _anywhere_ , Lance—you’re supposed to be _dead_ why are you _here_? Stop messing with my fucking head!” 

If Keith was even able to see anything at all, he would have seen Lance’s face blank out at the mention of “death.” It was an abrupt transition Keith only saw the after effects of once smearing the sleeves of Lance’s jacket over his eyes. Lance’s mouth was pulled down in a straight line, tense shoulders now slack, and eyes merely watching the way Keith was falling apart. He couldn’t _fucking breathe properly_. Keith shouldn’t have to tell Lance that he was dead unless it was at Lance’s urn. Life just didn’t work like that.

Keith gripped at his chest, gasping hard before angrily shoving Lance again. “Don’t just _stand there_! Why the hell are you here?!” he all but screamed. He checked his voice then, his paranoia hitching as he looked towards his bedroom door. Lance did the same before turning back to Keith with his wide, dark eyes impassive.

“How long’s it been?” he asked.

Keith’s shoulders heaved for a second before he shook his head, hissing, “How long’s _what_ been?”

Lance rolled his eyes, slapping his hands down against his legs. “I _mean_ , how long have I been dead? When’d I die?” 

Keith stared at him, more frantic than before. “What do you mean by that?! How long did you plan it? _How long have you wanted to fucking die_?” he demanded savagely, stepping towards Lance and pushing him into the wall again, slamming Lance’s shoulders into it once, twice, before slamming his fists onto Lance’s chest, sobbing hard with his forehead falling against Lance’s bony collarbone. 

Lance seemed hesitant to hug Keith, and even when they were hugging one another, Keith couldn’t help but feel selfish. He shouldn’t be able to do this. He wasn’t _supposed to_. Lance probably didn’t want to be this close to Keith anymore anyways, not after—

“D-Do you remember o-our fight?” he asked, and he felt Lance hum a little, and how it vibrated against Keith’s cheek. 

“Um… I don’t know. Who won?” Lance asked with a little giggle, and Keith scoffed against him, pushing away a little and looking towards the window so Lance wouldn’t have to see the tear tracks on his cheeks. 

“ _God_ , I can’t believe it. Even dead you still act like _you_ ,” Keith said.

“Clearly I am me—”

“ _No_ , clearly you _aren’t_ you because _something_ was wrong and you never even told me,” Keith snapped, clenching his fists at his sides. “Why didn’t you tell me something was wrong?” 

Keith was still staring at the window, but he could still see Lance studying him like this was all new to him. Or the fact that Keith was asking was weird to Lance. Like Keith should _know_ without having to ask. “I dunno. Because it’s a bummer, I guess,” Lance said, and Keith glimpsed over at him as he shrugged, folding his arms over his chest. “And I don’t like talking about bummers.”

It sounded familiar to Keith—that echo again, like how Lance was just some resonation of his past self. But Keith _swore_ he heard Lance say something like that before, mainly because they had been talking about a name in the newspaper that smelled like bacon. They happened to be eating peanut butter sandwiches that day, and Keith distinctly remembered thinking that bacon and peanut butter were an excellent combination. Someone on their campus committed suicide by jumping off the bridge, and their name smelled like bacon.

“Then why did you have to become a bummer,” Keith asked, voice shaking. “Why did you have to _go_ , Lance?” 

His hands fell weakly on Lance’s chest, and they stayed there until he felt the heat on his cheeks growing cold, and the dampness there turning crusty and dry. Keith barely cried. The one time he did Lance told him to stop it because he hated it when people cried. He was surprised Lance didn’t scold him now for his breakdown. It was the sort of thing Lance would do as a way of helping Keith jump the hurtle and get over it, but he just… stood there and took it. 

“I’m awful at this sort of thing,” Lance sighed, admittedly and almost… ashamed of it. Keith couldn’t imagine why, especially when it felt like his chest was about to burst, and _fuck,_ Lance was right there. 

Keith breathed in sharply, sniffling a little, before saying past the lump in his throat, “You’ve been gone over a week.” 

Lance hummed thoughtfully at that, as if he expected there to be more time than that. “Interesting… so what day is it then? Must be near finals, huh.” Keith nodded mutely, his hands now gripping the loose fabric of Lance’s shirt. He couldn’t—or, more accurately, _wouldn’t_ —let Lance go in fear of something happening. He wasn’t sure what, but the idea of Lance disappearing again threw him into conflicting turmoil. If Lance stuck around, would that mean Keith would never finish grieving? Would he ever stop? Would he just be a mess like this for months, or God forbid _years_? 

Keith never grieved before. He never expected himself to.

After a few minutes, Keith finally unlatched his hands from Lance’s shirt. It was all wrinkled now, so Lance smoothed it out as Keith turned away, hands still partially raised on the way to tug at his hair. He wandered over to the only bed in the room and lowered himself down onto it, and realized a little too late that the light was still on in the room, despite it being pitch black out. Lance was still standing in the middle of the room with no real idea of what to do after discovering his death and lack of _things_. 

Keith cleared his throat a little, head propped up on his pillow. “You can turn off the light and sleep over here,” he suggested.

Lance blinked at him for a moment before heading for the light. “The real question is do I even _need_ sleep if I’m a ghost?”

“I think ghosts can walk through walls. Can you walk through walls?” Keith asked, and Lance gave a halfhearted shrug before slapping his hand over the light switch. 

Instantly they both realized that Lance was more or less a faint, battery-almost-dead nightlight. It was soft and seemed to illuminate his figure like a halo, and it did wonders in lighting up the mood. Lance instantly gasped excitedly, and jumped to the now open space in the middle of the room. 

“This is so cool!” he said, voice hushed as if they were at a slumber party, and were afraid of alerting the parents. Keith laughed, nose still stuffy and voice even worse. Lance started out slow, dancing with a pattern to his footsteps, before he all but let loose and took the floor in a sweep of ridiculous break-dance moves and one half-assed cartwheel.

Keith hid his face in his pillow and whined, “ _Stop_ , Lance, you’re so ridiculous.”

He was doing body-rolls and dragged a hand down the length of his torso before pointing it at Keith. “You’re just jealous. We always have the greatest dance parties.”

_Had_ , Keith wanted to correct, but he felt like that would insult the Lance that was smiling like an idiot in front of him.

Eventually Lance glided up to the bed and knelt beside it, leaning his forearms over it and propping his chin up. “So… what happened to my bed and stuff? Did my parents take it?” he asked.

“Yeah, they came a little over a week ago,” Keith confessed. His nose felt like it weighed a ton. “Your mom gave Hunk all your photos.”

“Hm. I wonder what he’ll do with them. He’s not the sorta guy to leave it all lying about,” he commented, brushing his hand over the comforter. Keith watched it, and the glow over the blanket, and where Lance’s fingers grazed the surface. Lance was as real as Keith could ever hope at this moment if he was able to interact with _things_ in general.

“You’re right,” he mused aloud. “He told me today that he wants to make a scrapbook or something. And he’s gonna send it to your mom.”

“Send it? Dude, we live like two blocks apart,” Lance snorted, and proceeded to roll onto the bed with a sigh. “I bet they’re gonna make pies all the time. _Ugh_ , without me. In the summer we’d make these _awesome_ smoothies and stuff. Now I want a smoothie. Can we get a smoothie?” 

Keith was now wedged between Lance and the wall, and thankfully his bed wasn’t a twin anymore. He managed to convince his brother to help haul in a double, and while it took up more space, it was easier to share with people. Namely Lance.

Keith studied Lance as the kid rambled and ranted about summer smoothies. Eventually, Lance turned onto his side to face Keith, even if Keith probably looked like complete shit from crying. He breathed in sharply, and looked away from the edge of Lance’s highlighted hair. “I suppose now is the time to tell you that your parents are moving to Oregon,” he told Lance. 

His eyes went wide, and he proceeded to sit up and stare at Keith incredulously. “You’re lying,” he said, his doubt causing his grin to grow. “You’re _so_ lying. My parents would _never_ move to—wait, okay. So maybe they’d move to _California_ because you hyped it up so much but _Oregon?_ ” 

Keith shrugged uselessly, so Lance laid back down, staring at the ceiling. “Oregon?” he repeated, utterly confused. It was almost as if Oregon didn’t even exist to him. “I need to see them,” he said quietly. “I need to see my parents.”

“That… isn’t exactly the greatest idea—”

“Can we go to Oregon?” Lance asked, and Keith moaned in annoyance and turned over.

“Good _night_ , Lance,” he groaned, clutching at his pillow and cringing when Lance murmured “Oregon…” under his breath again. Keith grabbed the corner of his pillow and slapped it over at Lance to shut him up before angrily stuffing it under his head again. Lance blubbered about it for a minute or two before grudgingly agreeing to sleep.

Did ghosts sleep, though?

  


  


Lance wasn’t a ghost. A ghost wouldn’t be able to cuddle in the middle of the fucking night, or wake up and steal Keith’s phone to scroll through his Facebook wall full of, “You were one of my greatest friends and I’ll never forget you,” posts. That was how Keith found Lance in the morning, one arm around Keith holding him to Lance’s chest, and the other holding up the phone close enough to his face to blend out the blue light shimmering on his stray hair strands. 

Keith startled awake from a dream, jumping up, eyes wild, only to blurt out, “ _Jesus!_ ” when he realized that Lance was in the bed with him— _with his phone as well_.

Lance jumped a little in surprise, and Keith slammed back against the wall, bumping his head in the process. He groaned, holding his hand to the spot and realizing that his cheeks felt raw and his eyes felt even _worse_ than they did the previous night. They were crusty and bloodshot, so he rubbed his hands over them with a moan of distress. “Wow, what a way to wake up,” Lance commented. “You were crying in your sleep earlier. I was gonna wake you up but I wasn’t sure if—”

“Did you even _sleep_ at all?” Keith asked, squinting at Lance. “How are you still here? What are you even doing?”

“I did sleep for a little while. And—oh, sorry, I was just checking Facebook,” he confessed, passing Keith’s phone back. Keith blinked bleary-eyed at it as Lance continued, “Why does everyone have to be such bummers?” he asked, passing the phone back to Keith. He made sure to check what, exactly, it was Lance was looking through, and realized dreadfully that Lance “liked” every single fucking post. 

“You piece of shit—this is _my_ account. You couldn’t have logged out or something?” Keith complained, sitting up in bed and scrolling through the wall. He had to be at least fifty-some posts down. 

“People took time to write those, you know! Show your appreciation,” Lance complained.

Keith scrambled over Lance and dropped onto the floor. He gathered his footing and shook his phone at Lance. “My phone is off limits,” he hissed.

“But—But I don’t have a phone—!” Lance whined pitifully, reaching for Keith’s hand where the phone was. He dragged it out of reach and went over to his rack of clothes. “What are you doing?”

“Getting ready for class,” he answered. 

Lance was quiet for a moment, sitting up in bed with his hair mused and all over the place. “What am I supposed to do?” he asked, and Keith glanced over at him. Seeing Lance in the room sent a little chill down his spine. Lance wasn’t supposed to be here anymore—it felt wrong hiding him in Keith’s room, or keeping him there in general. But then again, that made Lance sound like an object of some sort. He was still a person, wasn’t he?

Sort of.

“The fuck if I know,” Keith muttered, turning back to yank a shirt off a hanger and tear off the one he was wearing. “You definitely _can’t_ come to class with me, and you definitely _can’t_ leave this room,” he said.

“Why not?”

“Because what if other people are able to see you?” Keith asked, and after a split second Lance countered with, “You think you’re hallucinating, don’t you?”

Keith scoffed, tossing his shirt over his shoulder and grabbing a towel and his shampoo. “Yeah, and even if you say I’m not it’s not like I can trust what you say,” he said, glancing over at the bed where Lance was now scowling at him. He sighed and said, “What is it?”

“Oh, nothing,” Lance said, sticking his nose in the air and looking away. “I just think it’s pretty insincere of you to say something like that. Maybe if we just bring Hunk over and if he sees me then—”

“ _No_ , no way,” Keith snapped, hissing, “I am _not_ helping you turn Hunk into a blubbering mess again. And I refuse to go over there because it’s just one bit _sob fest_. And you know they’re throwing a party this Friday to raise money for your family?”

Lance frowned at him, his brow tense and shoulders stiff. “Yeah, well I still want to see Hunk! Bring him over!”

“Fuck no! I’m not putting Hunk through this,” Keith retorted, seething. “And if you seriously _want_ to put Hunk through what I just went through last night, then you’re seriously a shit friend.”

The second he said it, he realized that was a terrible thing to say to someone who just committed suicide. Even if Lance didn’t remember it, he was still at that point of debating it. He was still considering it, even if it had already happened and he was _gone from the world_. The last thing Lance needed to hear was that he was a shit friend to Hunk.

And just like how Lance wasn’t good at dealing with crying, or things that “bummed him out,” Keith was _awful_ at saying the right thing in emotional situations, and fixing it. 

Lance set his lips tight to keep them from quivering. “You’re _wrong_ ,” he hissed at Keith. “I’m an _awesome_ friend. I just—Hunk and I— _You_ wouldn’t understand because you never had a friend like Hunk as long as I have! Hunk _would_ want to see me!” 

Keith was so startled that he couldn’t even hide it on his face. He knew the wasn’t the first time Lance ever yelled at him like this, and it was all just an echo of how they left off before Lance left him for good. As much as he loved verbal arguments, he couldn’t stand to be in one with Lance. He couldn’t let this fight get out of hand like the last one. 

His best tactic was compliancy.

“You’re right,” he said quickly. “I didn’t mean it—it was a stupid thing to say. I’ll—I’ll see what I can do about getting Hunk over here. Just… Just _please_ don’t leave the room today, all right?” Keith was so incredibly desperate, and it completely showed and floored Lance for a second. 

Lance hesitated on the bed—he looked like he wanted to storm off or something. Instead, he just sat there and nodded quietly. Keith studied him for a moment because sometimes Lance was unpredictable. He didn’t doubt that this version of Lance was entirely capable of ignoring him altogether and making a run for it.

So Keith backed towards the door, eyes on Lance at all times. “I’ll be gone for a few minutes. My phone is off limits.”

“Aye aye, sir,” he said, saluting Keith. Keith reached for the door handle behind him and propped it open, narrowing his eyes at Lance. Slowly, he closed the door, and let out a small sigh. 

A split second later, someone made a large crunching noise, causing Keith to jump and spin around, startled to find Michael there walking out of the kitchen with a bowl of cereal. “You have a new guy over last night?” he asked Keith. 

Keith narrowed his eyes at Michael and flipped him off on his way to the shower. Michael laughed, saying, “Congrats dude!” before disappearing into his own room and making sure to wink at Keith before completely disappearing. Every now and then Keith swore he hated having flatmates, but that was just a damn lie.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things I can confirm are true about Lance: He's not a ghost. He sleeps. And he's a nightlight. 
> 
> I'm sure I can squeeze in a part where Keith watches Lance sleep to make sure he _actually_ sleeps, but that's for another time my dudes ;)


	5. In The Mood

If Keith was terrible at concentrating before Lance reappeared, he was absolutely useless now. Nothing seemed to phase him aside from the scent of chlorine fading from his senses. He could think about Lance now, but it wasn’t nearly as prominent as before. Before… it was like Lance was so close to him, suffocating his senses, forcing Keith to _pay the fuck attention_ —

He was in such a daze that he hadn’t realized his phone was ringing until someone nudged him in the arm. They were in the middle of the _goddamn lecture hall_ and everyone could hear it. He could tell the professor was trying to ignore it but was totally looking their way. Keith scrambled for his phone and silenced it, his heart hammering fast in his chest. _How embarrassing_ , he thought to himself. _First Lance just_ had to go _“like” all the fucking grief-ridden posts on his Facebook wall, and now the entire lecture hall knows I play Assassin’s Creed based on my ringtone choice._

What a way to start his day.

Keith pressed his fingers to his eyes and sighed before dropping his hands onto his notebook and folding it closed. Why the hell was he there when he couldn’t even see straight or think straight. There were more important things to worry about than exam prep he didn’t really care much about. 

He stuffed his notebook into his backpack and got up from his seat. He shuffled past peoples feet and backpacks before climbing up the isle stairs to the back of the room. He barely got through the door before his phone started vibrating now that it couldn’t blast the Assassin’s Creed theme song.

The lecture hall door clicked shut behind him as he stuffed one hand in his pocket, and rose his phone to his ear with the other. “What is it?” he asked, voice still groggy. That tended to happen after a night of partying, or a night of crying. 

“Wow, good morning to you too,” Pidge muttered, voice crackling over the line. There was a howl of wind there, and with it came the tangy sweetness of Skittles. Keith couldn’t imagine talking to anyone without some part of them coming through to him. The fact that Pidge was so inclined to call rather than text was something he could appreciate if he didn’t feel dead inside every time she called. “Calling to see how you were. You were kinda zoning when we left.”

_When they left?_ he repeated internally, trying to remember what exactly it was that happened yesterday. Everything just screamed _Lance_ , and definitely not… Oh yeah, they watched a movie the night before. He, Pidge, and Hunk. “Oh, right, sorry. I was just super tired,” he confessed. “I haven’t been sleeping the greatest.”

Pidge snorted a little and said, “You and be both. I was just gonna head back to my dorm and get my snooze on. Literally. I’ll probably hit the snooze button about five times.”

“Don’t you have night classes on Thursdays though?” he countered.

“Yeah, but we’re really just bullshitting our way to Finals Week,” she confessed, breath panting as she hiked up some stairs. Keith paced out to the middle of the crescent hallway that outlined the lecture hall. There were tables and chairs all around, but there weren’t that many people so his voice kind of echoed but was never picked up by anyone other than Pidge. “You want to play a little Battlefield or somethin’? If you’re done with classes that is.”

_Lance_.

“Um… I think I might pass. And you’re right, you should probably sleep instead of playing _video games_ ,” he countered, and she chuckled at that. 

“ _Whatever_. Just checking in. And hey, if you see Hunk before tomorrow, tell him I say howdy.”

“Weird. Why?” he asked, laughing a little.

“Just do it, okay?” she snapped. “Bye loser.” 

Keith scoffed and hung up on her, and continued to stand in the open for a few minutes. It was nice because there was an excellent patch of sun there from the skylights, but eventually he’d have to move. So he sighed and started to wander to the door and out into the spring air. 

He was honestly so surprised at this point to walk outdoors and have it be relatively warm out. Though, there always seemed to be this stigma around here that suggested if you wore a jacket in this weather you were definitely from a warmer state—sort of like how Keith was from California. But either way he refused to take off Lance’s jacket, and figured if he kept wearing it, then he could keep pretending Lance wasn’t there. 

Because if Lance really _was_ there, still sitting in his apartment, he would have to face the reality that he had a dilemma to _seriously_ deal with. And some _serious_ issues to overcome. 

  


Back in their first semester living together, Lance may have been a mechanical engineering major, but there was more to him than calculus and “building things” mathematically. Lance wasn’t entirely into quantum mechanics so much as he was into what he considered to be the “finer things in life.” So their weekends were either spent partying until they collapsed on the bed closest to the door—Lance’s bed—or they were spent huddled under Keith’s comforter watching weird, obscure indie movies. Keith noticed that a lot of the finer things in life that Lance indulged in happened to involve Keith.

When asked about it, Lance frowned at him and said, “You know… you’re the only person I ever watch indie movies with.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Hunk doesn’t like watching movies with me,” he explained. “Much less these ones. He thinks they’re corny.”

“No way. Hunk’s such a deep guy—he’s gotta appreciate art, right?”

“That’s what I thought,” Lance scoffed, shaking his head. “What an animal. He’s a _Terminator_ , _Transformers_ kinda guy.”

Keith scoffed, murmuring the same as he felt Lance’s fingers brush over his wrist. He rolled his eyes, knowing for a fact that Lance was smirking. Lance always did shit like that when they watched chick flicks or semi-romantic films. Lance tended to get sick a lot during the winter, and would whine that they had to watch _Pretty Woman_. It was a habit Keith was thrown in with minimal warning—Hunk mentioned it briefly over the summer when Lance and Keith were nothing more than Facebook friends with a long, _long_ line of messages for proof of it. 

But romantic films in general were a hit or miss for them. Either they’d poke fun and critique ever goddamn bit of it, or Lance would… just do this.

And apparently Wong Kar-Wai did _this_ to Lance. It maybe had something to do with the intimate colors, and the softness of the film. How it was rounded over the edges and warm, and the tension they learned about through review articles and such. Apparently it was a film a girl in Lance’s Life Sciences class suggested. She was a Asian film-fanatic, and somehow had a background in cinematic studies. So of course Lance needed a background in that as well (it just seemed to be the way he worked). Though, Keith never understood why Lance was so adamant on watching a Wong Kar-Wai film with him when he never planned on pursing the chick in Life Sciences.

Perhaps it was just an excuse, or perhaps Lance never realized that he wasn’t interested in sleeping with the chick in Life Sciences.

The entire movie Keith was looking up obscure details about the director’s “cinematic masterpieces”—Lance needed to talk about this film with _some_ form of intellectual understanding. “Apparently everyone in this time was hella coy. Like, good luck tryna gauge who likes who, ya know? They couldn’t even touch one another without it being some sort of scandal I guess,” Keith was saying. Lance hummed thoughtfully, pinching his chin between his thumb and forefinger, addressing the film with almost as much intensity as Keith.

“How do people dissect films like that? And I’m not talking about the coy part—I mean, she was talking about _color_ being a huge factor but I just don’t see it…”

“You don’t have the artistic eye for it,” Keith said. “They use warm colors to… I don’t know. Make the scenes feel _evocative_ and just the _sexual tension_ is off the charts despite the fact that they aren’t even touching. You gotta imply shit to understand it.”

“Sexy.”

“Unbelievable,” Keith scoffed, and Lance smirked at him before turning back to the film at hand. They went silent during the moment of talking on screen. 

The film tasted like a old book—which had next to no correlation to the film and threw off the vibe a little. Rough, yellow pages didn’t seem like a good comparison to romantic undertones, but he couldn’t exactly control the flavor of a goddamn movie. 

It is what it is, and Keith came to terms with that a _long_ time ago.

Keith felt his insides coil when Lance glanced at him and it left nothing more than a centimeter between Keith’s cheek, and Lance’s lips. It was warm under the covers, but not quite stuffy, and after a solid five seconds, Keith sighed and rolled his eyes, and Lance had the audacity to _giggle_ about it. 

“How’s _that_ for sexual tension?” Lance jested, but didn’t pull back. His breath was minty, but when Keith looked at him, the deep brown texture of his skin sang swimming pool. 

Lance’s eyes were soft, watching Keith with that same, soft muted quality of the scene on the computer screen. Keith tried to read the yellow pages of it, and how they smelled to him in forms of warm red light and goddamn Wong Kar-Wai— _Why must you do this?_ Keith mused bitterly.

“Yeah, well,” Keith started, swallowing hard. He wasn’t completely unfamiliar with this situation. “How’s _this_ for evocative?” 

He dove towards Lance, crushing their lips together and feeling the tension pass quickly when Lance complied, and seemed to liquify and fade… like the effort to kiss was taxing. The initial response was nice though, Keith had to admit, so he could take that and pocket it for later. 

Keith was now propped up on his elbow, causing the comforter to tent over them as he studied Lance, with the subtitles on the screen passed to the side. They’d have to rewind a good five fucking minutes but he couldn’t care less. Lance was beyond flustered—he always was whenever he instigated things with _anyone_. Like half the time he didn’t expect them to work. 

“Seriously?” Keith hissed. “You claim you don’t have an artistic eye and then you completely understand the concept of visual tension as a form of sexual tension?” 

At this, Lance blinked rapidly and shook his head, scowling and snapping back, “What the hell does that even mean?!”

“ _Visual tension!_ It’s a basic form of—I dunno— _art!_ Like, two objects barely touching but looking at it makes you feel like they _are_ , or that they _will_ —which is a form of visual narrative but honestly you just _pegged it_ earlier,” he all but exclaimed, and Lance proceeded to argue with him over the fact that he wasn’t going for visual tension, which led Keith to shout, “Then what _were_ you going for!”

That night they finished the movie at a striking one in the morning—so really, it couldn’t be considered night at all. They usually discussed theories afterwards, but Lance was beyond exhausted so they called it a night. 

They walked to the bathroom together—it was just to the left of the kitchen—and shared the sink as they brushed their teeth. Lance spit out white minty foam and said, “I don’t know why we haven’t watched more of his movies.”

Keith paused for a second before bending over the sink and spitting out his toothpaste. He found his words after waving his toothbrush around for a second. “I mean—you had a midterm, that party, and then _I_ had evaluations and shit, and before that you had lab and another party so I mean—”

“Right, but also—”

“ _No_ , no— _you_ didn’t know this asshole even existed until you… you met that chick in O-Chem,” he accused. 

Lance looked at him, hand on his hip, and let out an exasperated _tsk_. “It was _Life Science_ , you twat.”

Keith choked a little on his water, gargled it, and spat it out before saying, “You _do_ realize that’s a British insult, right? Don’t go throwing that around, you fuck.”

“You’re such a hypocrite,” Lance sputtered out. He smeared a bit of gross yellow goo onto his hand and started rubbing it around his face. Keith’s nose scrunched up at it, but by now he was mostly used to Lance’s weird night routines. 

Keith headed back to the room before Lance and climbed into his bed. It was still warm and smelled faintly of an indoor pool. Sometimes Keith thought about last year, and what it must have been like for Hunk and Lance to live together. He always found it odd that Lance and Hunk decided they weren’t good roommates. It was one of those weird situations where close-living quarters nearly ruined their friendship. Evidently they had a huge fallout at the end of the year and swore never to talk to one another again—a bit dramatic for Keith’s tastes, but knowing Lance now, that was entirely plausible. 

As it happened, Lance caved and begged for Hunk’s forgiveness. At that point they forgot what the whole argument was about, so Hunk broke down crying and there was a whole fiasco where they could only talk over Skype because Hunk was on vacation for the summer—at that point Keith and Lance were already planning to live together. He was given the details as the reunion was happening.

A few minutes after Keith got around to closing his eyes, Lance came into the room. A few minutes later, the lights shut off, and Lance collapsed into his own bed with a sigh. Keith settled his hands behind his head and stared at the ceiling the entire time, wondering just how insane he was to think any of this was _average_. Everything was _average_ , but in reality, Keith never thought anything about Lance was “average.” The kid was a 4.0 genius, life of the party, a goddamn golden-skinned ray of sunshine who by some miracle thought it was a hobby screwing around with Keith’s emotions like this. 

So yeah, Keith and Lance were roommates now.

  


  


Keith stood outside of his apartment door debating whether or not he should go in. It was strange seeing it as a looming figure as opposed to the home it once was. It had been this way for over a week now, but today was... different. Lance was on the other side. All this time Keith would prepare himself to go in and expect to be alone for the night. 

Perhaps now he was expecting it to be the same. He didn't want to spend another night alone, especially now that some apparition of Lance was following him around.

Keith couldn't seem to breathe in most instances. It felt like the air was being sucked out of his lungs, and before it was always replaced with chlorine, but even that was fading. It had become so faint throughout the day that Keith was struggling to grasp on to it. It was nothing like before—when Lance's scent just... vanished.

With a heavy, dreadful sigh Keith made in entrance and clamored up the steps. He unlocked the second door--the door that would bring him to the living room, and soon he was faced with... a collection of his other flatmates. Worn socks for Michael, and alfredo sauce for his roommate John. 

They were both studying Keith's door when he happened to enter. Michael looked at him with an interesting tilt of his head before facing the door again. 

"Uh..." Keith started, letting his backpack fall to his side. "Is something... wrong?"

John leaned over to look at Keith and said, "It smells the goddamn pool in here. Also that guy is still in your room. Shouldn't he have left by now?" 

Keith stared at them both, and wondered if he looked equally confused by it because regarding the first half, Keith was _entirely_ confused. As far as he knew, he was the only one capable of smelling it. For a large portion of his life he expected everyone to be smelling what he did whenever he saw a person, but the fact that people stuck around horrible-smelling people always confused him until the day he figured out that he _was_ different. Not everyones' senses were confused like Keith's were.

He shouldered past them and went to the door before realizing that they were still observing. “There’s nothing to see here! Shoo, shoo!” he snapped, waving his hands at them. 

“Then you should know that he was blasting… What’s her name? I always confuse those artists…” Michael said, snapping his finger for John to fill in the blank.

“Beyoncé. He was blasting Beyoncé on your stereo system,” he said dully, and glanced over at his roommate before adding, “I think you might have found a Lance imposter. He used to blast that all the time and no offense, but it kinda got on our nerves.”

“Well, it’s a little _too late_ to be complainin’ about it, huh?” Keith snapped, and John merely shrugged before sauntering off to his room. Michael followed after him, and Keith waited until they were out of sight before slinking into his room and discretely closing the door behind him. 

He barely got a step into the room before he was assaulted with a barrage of “ _KEEEITH!_ ” and “You took so long—! I didn’t think you’d come back for me!”

Keith was so startled that they both fell back against the door, and Lance clung to him like Keith was only thing in the world keeping him together. Keith was still reeling over what John and Michael said. It meant that Lance wasn’t just a hallucination. And could he even be a ghost-slash-apparition if he could _interact with Keith’s fucking stereo system?_

He didn’t even want to think about the idea that the chlorine was starting to affect other people.

Keith hissed at him to be quiet, his paranoia hitching on the idea that their flatmates could hear them. Lance hesitated, holding onto Keith’s shoulders until Keith batted him off. “You need to be more quiet! I can’t believe you used the _speakers_ ,” he snapped at Lance, and sighed before he could press the matter further. “Whatever. Just don’t… cause any _attention_.”

“Well, _sorry_ I get _bored_ sometimes,” Lance complained, arms swinging as he turned back to Keith’s bed and collapsed face-first on it. Keith was still trying to comprehend how _real_ Lance looked, but he was startled by the buzzing in his pocket. Lance was groaning and moaning and rolling around on the bed. It wasn’t at all an odd occurrence, Keith realized—Lance used to do the weirdest things when he got into these kinds of moods.

Keith checked his phone and frowned at the name listed there. A text message from his brother. They didn’t really talk all that much, but ever since he heard about Keith’s roommate passing away… well, let’s just say Keith’s brother was more understanding than usual. 

He was too busy reading the text to fully comprehend what Lance was moaning about until he came back to “reality.” 

“I wanna go to Oregon—I wanna go to Oregon—Keith, take me to _Orrregooon_ …” Lance groaned into the pillow. 

Keith fell back on the habit he acquired—sighing in a dejected, detached sort of way. “ _Lance_ , I have finals…”

“But _after_ …” he droned, flopping off the side of the bed. He laid there, partially upside down and pleading with Keith through his wide eyes and pouty lips. Keith tilted his head to the side to see Lance better, but Lance just twisted his head the other way. It was so surreal. Keith was starting to feel like… this was Lance. The scent was stronger here, and Keith was starting to forget about how his entire lecture was spent trying to hang on to that last thread vanishing in potency…

Keith wandered over to the bed and dropped to his knees, his nose pressing into Lance’s. “And what do you think your parents will say if they see you?” he asked quietly, leaning back so he could see Lance’s eyes looking up—or rather _down_ —at him. 

“I just want to see them. They don’t have to see me,” Lance insisted, flipping over and pushing himself on to his elbows. He was just lingering on the edge of the bed, so close to Keith’s face that he had to flicker between which eye he wanted to look at. They were a dark shade of blue, almost too dark to comprehend against his brown skin. “Please? _Please, please, please—_ ”

Keith’s phone buzzed again as Lance went on repeating the same word over again: “ _Please, please, please pleasepleasepleaseplease…_ ” Keith was in the middle of reading his brother’s text when Lance’s arms dropped around his neck, and all of Lance’s upper body weight fell over him. He dropped back, shouting, “ _Christ!_ ” and took Lance down with him. Unfortunately Lance still weighed the same as before, which meant there were 170 pounds of Lance digging into his ribcage and on top of his face.

The air whooshed out of Keith’s lungs and he coughed on it, shoving Lance to the side. The kid couldn’t seem to manage to stay still—he floundered around and clawed at Keith’s arms before suddenly his hands were tearing at Keith’s phone and ripping it out from under his fingers. Keith lunged for Lance, but he was already across the room, crawling on his hands and knees, and huddling against the wall reading whatever text it was on Keith’s phone.

“You can’t just— _Lance_! Stop looking at my _phone!_ ” Keith shrieked, lunging at Lance and knocking them both into the wall. Lance’s hand pushed into his head and shoved him back, but Keith’s hands still clawed at his shirt and yanked on it until the collar stretched and the fabric creaked.

Lance held out the phone far, _far_ from Keith’s reach and said, “Ah, ah, ah! What happened to not letting our flatmates know about me?” At that, Keith hesitated, realizing that he had completely just shouted Lance’s name like a fucking idiot. When Keith relaxed, Lance did as well, and claimed Keith’s phone as his own. “Huh, your brother’s texting you. What about?” 

Keith rolled his eyes and tried to snatch the phone again—the attempt was half-hearted, so Lance easily swiped it out from under him. “He’s just checking up on me. Making sure I’m not, I dunno, drinking too much or whatever,” Keith muttered, crossing his arms and leaning back on his heels, crouched down beside Lance as he suddenly looked up at Keith, and again between him and the phone.

“Drinking too much? You haven’t been—?” Lance repeated, eyebrows scrunching together. “You haven’t been drinking much at parties though—I swear you were babysitting me the last two parties.”

Keith tried to even remember the last time he and Lance went to a party where _he_ babysat _Lance_. He couldn’t remember Lance going hard at any point in the last… _month_ before he passed away. That didn’t seem to be accurate because Lance always had a good time whenever he drank. He could hold his liquor well, and only once ever threw up, and beside that, drinking just made him an unnecessarily happy individual. If he was feeling terrible the entire month before dying, why would he…?

“I know what you’re thinking,” Lance said quietly, his fingers picking at a chip in Keith’s phone case. “I’m guessing we didn’t go partying that last month.”

“We went to one party,” Keith corrected, “You didn’t drink at all. But I went _hard_ and it was _messy_. I was a _shitshow_ and we had to leave early.”

“ _Really_? Shit, why can’t I remember that? I wish I could have seen it!” Lance whined, but Keith was shaking his head fast and insisting it was the for the best that he couldn’t remember it. That night was… _something else_. Definitely something else.

“But why would you suggest…?” Keith started, unsure how to phrase it.

Lance flopped his hands down on his lap and rolled his eyes, “I’ve been planning it for a while. Like… I wanted to do it before college, and then I just felt like shit because we’d already paid for everything and I didn’t want to ruin that, so I stuck around. But _then_ Hunk wanted to join the fraternity and refused to rush without me so I ended up joining Kappa _Sigma…_ and _then_ I felt guilty for all the payments for that and I couldn’t just _join for no reason_ , you know?

“So… stay till the end of the year. And in the last month if I can’t stand it sober there’s no point so there you have it,” he said, his smile crinkling up his eyes and succeeding in making Keith exceptionally more sad than he was before this conversation.

Keith ducked his head down, scowling at his hands and feeling like he didn’t know Lance at all if _this_ was what Lance was thinking of for the past year. He thought he’d feel fine knowing that he wasn’t the initial cause of Lance’s mental suffering, but now he just felt like shit for having the time of his life being roommates with Lance, and never realizing that it wasn’t the case with Lance. 

“But hey—” Lance said, interrupting him with a hand rustling his hair. Strands of black hair obscured Keith’s vision when he looked at Lance again. “—I _really_ like being your roommate. Honestly! I’ve _never_ had this much fun until we met up at that party. It would be great if we could hang out like this all the time!”

As he said it, he fell towards Keith and rolled onto the ground, throwing an arm around Keith’s waist and pulling him down next to him. There wasn’t a rug on the dusty wooden floor anymore—the McClains took it—so it was just them on the paneling, staring at the crusty white ceiling before Keith decided to look at Lance and say, throat tight, “Then why didn’t you stick around?” 

Lance sighed, swallowing down whatever it was he meant to say. His Adam’s apple bobbed, and Keith watched Lance’s eyes flicker across the ceiling before he pulled Keith’s phone up. It glowed bluish on his face, and reminded Keith of Nightlight Lance yesterday. _How is any of this… real?_ he thought to himself as he recalled the fact that both Michael and John heard and _smelled_ Lance—how bizarre! It was clearly a logical way to combat Keith’s initial reaction to hallucinating. 

“You wouldn’t understand,” Lance answered quietly and shifted the phone so Keith could read what his brother said. “Your brother has a truck, doesn’t he?”

“Well, it’s more like an SUV,” Keith corrected, and reached up to take his phone back. Lance didn’t pull it away, so Keith took that as a sign that he was finally getting his phone back. He swiped his phone open and began texting Shiro back to let him know everything was all right.

Lance was quiet until Keith sent the text. “We could take his SUV,” he suggested, “and go to Oregon together. We always talked about going on a road trip or something. Or studying abroad together.”

Keith snorted, saying, “Yeah, but I thought you were _joking_. As if either of us would be able to pay to go abroad or whatever.”

“I mean, I don’t have any money really, but we could figure it out,” Lance said, sitting up and leaning over Keith, staring him down and going on with the plan. “You’ll ask your brother to lend the truck for a weekend or something, and we book it across country. If we switch off—”

“As if I’m trusting _you_ to drive! What if you randomly disappear—you aren’t even—you aren’t—” Keith rambled, studying Lance and trying to find an excuse to call him “ _not human_.”

Lance quirked an eyebrow up, challenging Keith to challenge him. “I didn’t disappear all day and I’m here right now and we _need to go to Oregon_ ,” he said, enunciating each word with a gentle shove on Keith’s shoulders. “You said you haven’t been using your own savings for anything aside from extra expenses, so we use that.”

“How do you— _wait_ , we haven’t talked about that since _October_ ,” Keith argued, and Lance shrugged as if to say October was no different from April. Keith set his jaw tight and scowled at Lance. “I am _not_ going across the country with you. And you probably wouldn’t want to go with me anyways.”

At that, Lance head tipped to the side, and Keith shuffled out from under Lance and made sure to secure his phone in his pocket. He didn’t need Lance getting ahold of it again. “What makes you say that? Of course I’d want to go on a road trip with you!” Lance said. “It’ll be fun!”

“Yeah, but you’re just saying that because you need _someone_ to go with you. It’s not like you can hitch a ride on an airplane when the state says that you’ve been cremated,” Keith argued, slapping his hands down on the ground with a shake of his head. “And I don’t want you involving Hunk in this—it’s been really hard on him. I don’t need you turning him into a mess again,” he said sharply, glowering at Lance from across the floor. 

Lance was still looking at him in confusion, like he couldn’t quite understand Keith’s reasoning. He realized that Lance didn’t remember the past month of his life, and that seemed to register with Lance as well. “You said that we had a fight—does it have to do with that?” he asked Keith.

Keith wanted to scream, “ _Yes_ , of course it has _everything_ to do with it!” but this wasn’t the same Lance Keith saw five days prior to his death. This wasn’t the Lance he had a screaming match with, and he still felt like their argument wasn’t meant to be spread. Hunk only knew bits and pieces of it—never the entire thing. 

So naturally, Keith didn’t want Lance to know what happened. “What? No, I’m just thinking rationally here,” Keith said instead, shaking his head.

Keith wondered just how much of Lance was still in his head. Could Lance tell what he was thinking? Were their brains awkwardly connected—because how else would Lance be able to bring up things Keith was sure he forgot about, like Keith’s financial situation, or exact phrases, like Lance being a bummer? 

Surprisingly, though, Lance’s expression didn’t seem to betray anything about it, and he talked fast enough to make it seem like he had no clue what Keith was thinking at that moment. “Whatever—if you don’t text Shiro about it I’ll text him. Tell him you’re going to Appleton for a few days with Hunk,” Lance said.

“ _No_ , I already said my phone is off limits,” Keith said, bolting up to his feet and walking across the room with a glare in Lance’s direction. He stood on the far side of the room, his hand in his pocket where his phone was. He thought about everything that could go wrong—going to Oregon meant one hell of a car ride. They’d have to sleep over at truck stops… horde Capri Suns in a cooler along with other nutritional necessities… schedule bathroom breaks at gas stations…

Pay for gas.

“We’ll take the fastest route,” Lance interrupted his thoughts, standing up and pacing a little as he thought through it. “We’ll go to _all the coolest places_ and go to Yellowstone, find some waterfalls, we could go to the _mountains_ —the Grand Tetons! Have you ever seen the Grand Tetons? We’ll spend a night in Jackson Hole and go to Utah for a day and see some cool desert-y stuff before cruising through Idaho and _boom!_ We’ll be at the coast in no time! We just have to make it through the Dakotas and three fourths of Wyoming without dying of boredom, and drive through _Montana!_ Have you ever been to Montana before? I heard it’s _beautiful!_ ” 

“We’ll get to see the Rocky Mountains…” Keith mused aloud, tapping a finger to his lips as Lance snapped his fingers at Keith, encouraging him to go on. “And… I’d get to see the Pacific again?”

“ _Yes!_ ”

“And we could get a lot of cool pictures?”

“ _Exactly!_ ”

“We could take a tent and go camping—”

“ _Yes yes yes!_ ”

“And we could go through Washington for a bit—I’ve never been there!” 

Lance was doing a little party-dance in the middle of the room as Keith went for his computer and pulled it up onto the edge of the bed. They both collapsed on the floor, watching as Keith figured out the timeframe—a little of a day nonstop, but they were going to make a vacation of it, right? So they wouldn’t be driving twenty-four straight hours. Eight hours at a time—three day trip—sleeping in Shiro’s SUV—they could pack for three days with just the two of them, right? They wouldn’t need much food at all, snacks at most, energy drinks, a McDonald’s stop here and there. All of their money would be reserved for gas after that. 

“So my parents are flying in the day before your last final?” Lance asked, and Keith nodded, bringing up his Facebook conversation with Ramira. She liked to give him updates every now and then, even when Lance was around. She was the sort of motherly individual who liked to show off her family to her friends, and so there was a plethora of pictures involving Lance’s siblings, pictures she uncovered while cleaning house, or even a tailgate party before a Packer’s game. 

“Yeah, and my last exam is in the afternoon… We really shouldn’t start until early the next morning—so then we could go shopping after my exam and get all of our supplies,” Keith said, and stretched far to snatch his backpack. He dragged it over and took out a notebook and pen. “What do we need that we don’t already have?”

As they started their list, Keith wasn’t entirely surprised that he caved. It was just a matter of making sure Shiro caved in order to get the SUV.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've never seen _In The Mood For Love_ by Wong Kar-Wai, but I REALLY WANT TO and REALLY NEED TO.


	6. Kappa Sigma

“You seriously can _not_ come to the party,” Keith said to Lance, jabbing a finger at his chest and pushing him back onto the bed—otherwise known as far, _far_ away from the door. 

As Keith rolled up the sleeves on his flannel, Lance whined about coming with. It was a task keeping Lance quiet to begin with, so according to Michael and John, Keith has had a guy trapped in his room for several days and night. And according to them, the entire apartment was starting to smell like a goddamn swimming pool. 

“It gives me a headache—what the hell even is it?” Michael asked earlier that day, which led Keith to guiltily shrug and not look at all convincing as he did it. So naturally, Michael and John blamed Keith for the smell problem, which was entirely accurate. 

Lance slouched on the bed as Keith tugged his foot up onto the edge of the end table and laced up his shoes. He remembered a time where whenever Keith wore shorts of some kind, Lance would make a point to drag his hand over Keith’s calf for no reason at all except to make Keith feel uncomfortable. At that moment, though, Lance was too upset to do so. 

“The party is for _you_ —you can’t come to it,” Keith argued.

“That’s every reason for me to go to it—”

“I meant for… _real_ you—you know, the one that’s _no longer with us_ ,” he hissed, and proceeded to roll his eyes when Lance pouted at him. Keith scowled at his sleeve as he finished rolling it up and let his arm drop to his side. Everything about this was terribly wrong. This clearly wasn’t Lance, but he _felt_ like him and acted like him, and here Keith was, about to go to a party meant for _real_ Lance. The _dead_ one. 

Keith looked nervously at Lance again before turning away completely and reaching for his phone. He stuffed it into his pocket along with his keys, purposefully avoiding Lance the entire time. Maybe if he didn’t look at Lance, he could pretend like Lance wasn’t even there. Yes. Good plan.

At least until Lance opened his mouth and started babbling again.

“What makes you think I’m not real?” Lance asked, and the sheer amount of dejection in his voice caused Keith’s feet to stutter over the floorboards. “I’m still _me_ , you know—”

“ _No_ ,” Keith hissed, fists clenching at his sides. “You _aren’t_. If you were you… you wouldn’t be acting like this! You’d be dead—you wouldn’t even be here!”

“And who even said I wanted to be here?” he argued, keeping his voice as low as possible to avoid another screaming match. At least, to Keith it would be. To Lance it would be the first time they ever yelled at each other like they seriously meant it. “I though I was just coming back for my phone but guess the fuck what! Joke’s on me—I died and I missed the party! If I could kill myself again, I would—”

Keith spun on him, his face contorted in a mix of anger and raw misery. How could someone just—? How could _Lance_ just say that? “Don’t you fucking _dare_ say that again,” Keith hissed at him. “Don’t act like it’s so easy. Don’t act like you—you—”

“Well now it’s not exactly a surprise to you, huh?” Lance said, voice clipped and sharp around the edges. It cut into Keith all over again. “Since you know _all about me_ now, it shouldn’t be a problem to talk about how I _really_ feel. So maybe I’m not real, and so maybe I can’t hurt myself, but the least you could do is treat me like a human being. How ‘bout that? Wasn’t exactly _hard_ before I died, was it?”

“ _Stop_ talking about it!” Keith snapped, his entire facing burning to the point where his ears felt like they were on fire, and it was leaking into his eyes and making them water. 

“How can you ignore something that’s obviously a huge part of our fucking society, huh? Aren’t you supposed to be unbiased, or whatever? Mr. _Lawyer_?” Lance snapped, and a chill went down Keith’s spine—there goes that echo again. Lance repeating things. Lance knowing _just_ where to push all of Keith’s buttons at once. “It’s like everyone wants to ignore the fact that so many people are _suffering silently_ and now that I’ve shattered that glass for you, why’s it so hard for you—for you—”

“ _STOP IT!_ ” Keith all but screamed, voice cracking and eyes glossy. Lance stopped, and it wasn’t until Keith cleared his vision that he realized that… there seemed to be a glitch.

Keith needed a _strong_ drink right about now.

Lance was in the process of rising, flickering like a television screen back and forth from sitting, to half-rising, to sitting again. It was so fast, like blinking, only the second it stopped Lance was entirely back to normal. “Honestly that’s every reason for me to go. The party’s about me, isn’t it?” Lance blurted out with a groan, falling back on the bed. Keith jumped a little, trying to calm his aching chest all while trying to breathe properly. _What the hell just happened to him…_?

Keith didn’t even say anything. He booked it out of the room and slammed the door shut behind him. He flatted himself against it, looking around the empty living room and forever grateful that Michael wasn’t around. Alfredo-sauce John had a habit of going home on the weekends, so he didn’t need to worry about John at all this weekend. The chances of Michael being out and about were high, but then again, Lance was always the one to keep track of them.

Keith couldn’t stop thinking about how fast that escalated. Lance _never_ let things escalate—he hated verbally fighting with Keith, especially considering his fucking major. He wouldn’t get accepted into the business law program if he didn’t know how to win a fucking argument. It was a miracle Lance even wanted to live with Keith when he had a tendency to argue until people realized he was right—and he did that a lot with Lance. He rationalized things.

So maybe that was why Lance stuck around, because Keith was at least _logical_ in that sense.

But he couldn’t handle emotional arguments like that. He couldn’t do it. Not again.

Keith fumbled around with his keys and didn’t even hesitate to lock the door. He was grateful for this feature in their apartment, and he knew Lance would be pissed at him for locking the door, but he couldn’t risk it.

  


  


“Oh, hey Keith. You can skip the list—just drop the money off and get your stamp,” the guy at the table said, pointing to the person in charge of marking everyone’s hands. Keith slipped his money towards the tin on his way around the table, passing the people waiting in line to get their names checked off on the list. With the nice weather, everyone was outside, and the table was stationed on the front porch atop the set of stairs leading up to the Kappa Sigma house. 

The house itself had an older, german architecture to it with rugged stone arches on the first floor, and wooden timber panels over white siding going up to the third floor. It was one of the nicer frats on Frat Row from the outside, but just like any other frat on the street, the inside was either a disaster, or only half-decent on occasion. He’d only been there a few times during the day, which was enough to see the damage a few nights of partying could do to the state of the floorboards and the stains on the walls. 

Keith pushed through the front door and into the squarish foyer, where some of the guys were checking in coats, bags, and purses and stashing them in a back room. He asked where Hunk was, and was directed to the stairs. He thanked them and slipped past to hurry up the steps to find Hunk’s room. 

He lived in the far back of the frat house on the second floor, so Keith found himself avoiding the guys and girls lingering out in the hallway. Those that knew Keith would give pitying looks that made him downright ill at the sight of them. It was worse when they actually said something, like, “Hey man, good to see you around again. How are you?” in a way that was meant to be sympathetic, and meant to connect them both on a level they were meant to be on. Grieving. 

Keith cringed and grimaced all the way through until he finally reached Hunk’s door, only to realize that there was… a line outside his door. People gave him semi-dirty looks when he barged up to the front and knocked on the door hard and fast and with the desperation of someone who _seriously_ needed to get out of there. When Hunk didn’t answer straight away, Keith said, “ _Hunk_! I know you’re in there! It’s me, Keith!”

“Oh shit—hang on!” Hunk hollered back, voice muffled. 

Keith rolled his eyes and leant back on his heels, and took a moment to glance at the line. The girl before Keith gave him a dirty look, so he returned the favor until the door suddenly clicked open and Hunk leaned out. “Hey guys! There’s only ten left!” he shouted down the line. “Fight amongst yourselves—only ten people come through here, sorry!”

Some people farther down the line groaned. Keith quirked an eyebrow up at Hunk, who wiggled his brows at Keith before dragging him into the room. 

He stumbled into the space where one of Hunk’s frat brothers was perched on the bed forking through someone’s stack of singles before stuffing it in a tin of money and handing over a plastic baggie to the latest visitor. Keith remembered the guy’s name easily—it was the only name he knew of that reminded him of his favorite carnival snack. Sugared, roasted almonds… and the sweet syrupy scent of it never ceased to cloud Keith’s head with nostalgic, warm thoughts. 

He was a tall, gangly fellow with a habit of wearing beanies and completely destroying everyone in arm wrestling matches. Considering he looked like such a beanpole, the size of his arms went underestimated by most, so Keith wasn’t surprised that when Peter Kolivan clapped him on the back, the hand mark there left a sting for a few minutes. 

“Keith, buddy, how are ya?” he asked, grabbing Keith by the hand and reeling him in for a bro-hug. Hunk was seeing the visitor out of the room, so it was just the three for them for the moment. “Did you just get here? You buyin’ a brownie?”

“A brownie…?” Keith started, confused before he pieced it together. They wouldn’t be selling brownies on the second floor, locked in Hunk’s room, with secretive plastic baggies full of them. Keith snapped his mouth shut and simply murmured, “Oh.”

“No peer pressure, but…” Hunk started, swinging over to them with a bounce in his step, “I _did_ happen to make them today. And they’re _stupidly_ strong, so ya gotta be careful. Don’t even eat half the serving size—split it with someone. And after we pay off the _three hundred dollars_ worth of pot in it, we’ll send the rest to Lance’s family. We’ve already gone over a hundred.”

Keith laughed and said, “No kidding? How much?”

Kolivan waved his hand and slid off the bed. “No charge for you, buddy. We’re savin’ a few for friends,” he said, and Keith glanced over at Hunk who was still wriggling his eyebrows at Keith like he had a huge secret about this batch of brownies that Keith didn’t want to know.

So Keith had a baggie plopped into his hand after he agreed to eat it, and it wasn’t via peer pressure. If anything, Keith was already prepared to fork over twenty dollars on alcohol tonight, but this would suffice. _And_ it was free. _And_ he trusted Hunk’s baking skills so a moment later Keith tore off half the brownie and popped it into his mouth.

It tasted like something _awful._ It was like eating raw, damp oolong tea leaves with nothing but a hint of dark chocolate to it. Keith’s face screwed up and he coughed a little, and Hunk threw his head back laughing. Kolivan snorted from the sidelines, saying, “Shit—even that’s a bit much huh?”

Keith rubbed the back of his hand over his mouth, saying, “What do you mean?”

“By half I sorta meant a third, maybe a fourth,” Hunk confessed, grinning all the same. “But it’ll be fine. Give it an hour to settling in. I’ll make sure to find you then.”

Keith stared at them both like they were insane. It explained why that bite had such an awfully potent taste to it. “Right…”

“What about that short girl you hang out with? Is she comin’ to the party?” Kolivan asked. “I saw her name on the list.”

“Nah, she said she was busy,” Hunk said. “Finals and stuff.”

“Bummer. You coulda split it with her. I bet she’d have a blast with that stuff,” he commented, nodding to the other half of the brownie in Keith’s hand. Keith could still taste it on his tongue, and vowed that his next stop would be the bathroom to drink up as much water as possible from the sink.

“Oh yeah, Pidge told me to tell you that she says ‘howdy’ or whatever,” Keith said as he sealed the ziplock baggie. Hunk’s face contorted, and he made this strangling-motion with his hands as if the word _really_ tore at him. 

“I can’t _believe it_. One day I say I hated _Toy Story_ and the next she goes and destroys my life by using Woody’s vocabulary,” Hunk hissed, and Kolivan laughed and asked why he didn’t like _Toy Story_. “It gave me nightmares as a kid. You can’t blame me for not liking it now!”

Hunk followed Keith out of the room and ordered Kolivan to control the flow. Kolivan gave them both a thumbs up and waved to Keith, saying that he’d check up on Keith later, and that he wanted to see how strong of a batch they gave him. And honestly, Keith couldn’t wait to be gone to the world. 

They got down the hall to the opposite staircase—the one far, _far_ away from the commotion by the foyer—and Hunk leant up against the wall and tipped his head to the side, saying, “So… are you okay? I mean, I don’t mean to be annoying or anything but you… kinda look like shit right now.”

Being called out on it just made Keith’s throat close up a bit, but he swallowed it down and that _awful_ tasting shit on his tongue. “Yeah, I’m fine,” he said with a shrug. “How was the speech thing?”

“Oh it was good,” Hunk said, smiling a little. “Everyone was laughing and crying and it was _great_. I helped make the powerpoint presentation, and they projected it on the wall in the basement—you know, the one next to the Kappa Sigma sign. Anyway, we had a bunch of weird videos of Lance and people shared stories and stuff. It was really chill—it took up like an hour but… yeah… I used that video you took of him a while back. When you guys went to the art museum and posed like the statues and stuff. I hope you don’t mind that I used it or anything… it was just on my computer and stuff—”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Keith said, shaking his head. “That sounds awesome though. You’ll… have to show it to me later or something. Another time.”

“Yeah…” he agreed quietly, scratching the back of his head. They both fell silent when one of his housemates came up with a gang of guys and girls. They all but tackled Hunk on the way down the hall, and Keith got a bit of the attention as well, but stayed as flat against the wall as possible. He busied himself with folding up the brownie and stuffing it in his pocket. 

Hunk laughed and waved to them as they went on their way before turning back to Keith. “But yeah, it was really emotional. You wouldn’t have liked being there for an entire hour.”

“Not exactly my scene,” he agreed with a nod of his head. “You should head back. Kolivan needs a bodyguard with that… _three hundred dollars_ worth of weed brownies? Are you guys insane?” 

Hunk giggled and shoved Keith a little, saying, “So maybe we put too much in! But it’ll be worth it. And if you spot a guy named Henry, he ate a whole brownie and went missing. He’s got black hair… um, kinda Mexican, shorter, and I think he was wearing a red shirt.”

“Okay, I’ll keep my eyes peeled,” he promised.

Hunk headed back to his room where Kolivan was calling for the next person to come in. Keith looked after them for a moment longer before heading for the stairs. He’d talk to Hunk later. 

Keith wandered down to the first floor again, and then again down to the basement where he came across the bar layout, and the people waiting in line for drinks. He went to the dancing area and stood just outside of it before realizing that he wasn’t really in the dancing mood at all. The music was fine, the lights were dim and flashing across the throng of people down there. The space was massive to begin with, and Keith could see the Kappa Sigma logo flickering in and out of focus among the strobe of multicolored lights.

And then, he saw someone relatively familiar and was drawn by their clearly ginger-tinted scent, and instantly regretted staring because a second later she turned her head around, blonde ponytail swishing, and smile growing at the sight of Keith. 

“Keith! I knew you’d come!” Nyma hollered, squeezing between people and tugging Keith by the arm into the horde of dancing, sweaty bodies. Keith stumbled into her, and tripped over someone’s foot, but caught his balance with a hand on her shoulder. “Oops! Careful there.”

“Well dragging me around isn’t exactly necessary…” Keith mumbled to himself, only to be shouted at with a, “What did you say?” He shook his head and hollered, “Never mind!” over the music.

The speakers were a little too perfect, and managed to rumble Keith’s stomach and remind him that his mouth still tasted like edible pot. Whatever the case, Nyma refused to let him leave for a second and dragged him into a dance that involved a lot of hips, and a parter or two. She was a year above him, and he knew as much from all the time he spent at the coffee shop below his apartment. 

She twisted him around, her slender pale arms going up to rest on his shoulders. He wasn’t exactly equipped to dance tonight, but for the sake of not making this awkward, Keith rolled with it and translated it into the flow of his body synching with the music. He remembered when Nyma transitioned to Kappa Sigma for the bulk of her partying, mainly because Lance took a fancy to her and offered to put her on the list whenever she needed a night out. “I’ll take _you_ out for a night out—party starts at nine, you in?” he’d say, and Keith would roll his eyes and Nyma would giggle and agree to it.

Keith had a habit, Lance would call it, of getting shit-faced and having the greatest time ever. Evidently Keith was known for it—he’d go to parties, down a few shots, and dance with all the girls and willing guys in the room. Lance wasn’t much better—in fact, Keith encouraged him. He even _egged Lance on_. Because at the end of the night, Keith knew that Lance would be the one coming home with him except for the times Lance went home with friends, or a girl here and there. But he heard enough stories to tell that for the most part, nothing happened, or if it did, Lance never revisited it. 

But he always came back to the apartment above the coffee shop, and would collapse into the first accessible bed—Lance’s bed—and moan, “I’m never drinking a _gaaain_ …” only to go to a party the next weekend and order Keith to babysit him.

Keith spent an hour dancing with Nyma and her friends until his brain started to feel sluggish. He swayed with his eyes closed and felt the fog of it curling around his head and drenching him in a dull, calming feeling. It didn’t hit him until he was leaning into Nyma and hearing her giggle, voice detached from him, “Whoa, you okay there buddy?”

“He musta had one of Hunk’s brownies,” her friend said, laughing as Keith flickered his eyes open and saw them all looking at him with bug eyes and turning him absolutely _hysterical._ What were they looking at anyhow? Did he have something on his face?

He slapped a hand onto his cheek and rubbed it down his face. “Brownies? Oh yeah! I—um—there was a—I went to his room. And—and—”

“Whoa, slow down there cowboy,” Nyma laughed, patting him on the chest. It felt funny and made him feel like a child. But he absolutely _wasn’t_ a child, so he slapped her arms away with a noncommittal hand, and ended up staring at it instead. The way it swayed across his vision was something entirely new to him—he could _see_ his _hand?_ How bizarre was that! He couldn’t see his own face, but he could see his hands in front of him like a third person video game. 

The girls were all laughing adorably at him, and he smiled at all of their smiles and felt giddy all of a sudden. It was a familiar feeling, being sucked into this bubbled world where he could feel his worries somewhere far inside his brain, like trying to remember a dream. The more he thought about what was stressing him out, the farther it strayed from him. And it was just him, and all these _smiling faces_ —

“Let’s get you someplace else, hm?” Nyma suggested, patting him on the chest again and laughing when he nodded, only to realize that there were colorful _lights everywhere!_ He stared at them on the walls and tried to reach for the ones strung above his head as they went for the nearest archway and disappeared through it.

Once they left the crowded area, the cool air swept over him. He liked that relief—but just the wave of it, because it didn’t linger or anything like that. It was one sharp cool breeze, and then it dissipated as fast as his skin coped with the temperature difference. He wanted to feel more of that.

“Can we go swimming?” he asked, and Nyma snorted and shook her head. “The gym’s still open, right? It’s just across the street—”

“We aren’t swimming, Keith,” she laughed, and cornered him in a room where some people were hanging around a set of couches. She dropped him into a chair among them, and laughed when he stared around at all the new faces and saw her face among them, bubbling like they were stuck in a fish bowl. “You okay, buddy? How ya feelin’?”

“I-I dunno,” he confessed. He was supposed to be feeling _something_ , but definitely not this… giddy bliss. He sat there for a while—it was probably a few minutes because Nyma clapped him on the shoulder and said she’d be off. And suddenly she was gone and he was still trying to remember how he was _supposed_ to be feeling. Something wasn’t right—

Where did all of his thoughts go?

“Hey man, you’re Keith, right?” someone said, and he bobbed his head, scooting forward on the chair so he wasn’t slouching anymore. “Sucks what happened to Lance, huh?”

Keith tried to find the guy’s face, but the words seemed to come from everywhere at once. He shook his head a little, eyebrows puckering together. _Yeah… Lance…_

“Yeah, but he’s still around,” he said with a wave of his hand.

“In our memories, yeah. He was a cool fuckin’ dude. One time I forgot my jacket around here and when I came back for it, he was _wearing_ it. What a bastard—practically stole my fuckin’ jacket. We had a good laugh over it,” he said, and the couch dipped next to Keith. He jumped a little, startled by it, and stared at the guy. His face was _incredibly_ close to Keith’s, and his eyes were bugging out of his head. 

Keith snorted a little and covered his mouth to obstruct his laughter. The guy laughed with him, “Yeah! It was funny.”

“N-No—your _face_ ,” Keith said, leaning forward and accidentally bumping their faces together. His depth perception seemed to be off.

All the people around the coffee table started laughing, and Keith’s face went red as he apologized and rubbed his hands all over the guy’s face. After that… his attention just faded. He didn’t pay attention to what they were all thinking. He was thinking about Lance.

Around that time he started to smell every little thing. He figured it was just all the familiar people in the room, but they were _strong_ , like how Lance smelt now. Lance was a fucking swimming pool. He was chlorine water. He was cool and refreshing after spending a week in… what was it? A depressed state? Yes… Keith was supposed to be depressed right about now.

He wanted to feel that cool, refreshing atmosphere again. He wanted to go to the swimming pool. 

“I wanna go swimming. Can we go swimming?” he asked them, and there was a break in their conversation. He realized that he interjected awkwardly there. “Never mind…” he drawled, and pushed himself to his feet. He swayed a little, and felt the world skew around him. Someone said something about being careful, but he just waved them off and started for the door.

Keith knew where the back door was, so he vowed to find it all over again and exit. There was another wall of fresh spring air on the other side, and he walked through it and staggered down the steps. The door swung shut behind him, and clicked into place. He stood outside, studying the parking lot back there, and all the cars on the street beyond that.

It was dark out. It felt nice. Damp, but nice. He combed his hands through his hair and closed his eyes for a while. He leant against the stone step railing and stood there for a good ten minutes listening to the cars and feeling the air on his face. Eventually he moved on in favor of locating the gym.

He started to wander around to the front of Kappa Sigma, to the road where Frat Row was located. On the way there, he smelled artificial fruity extracts and hesitated at that. _Pidge?_

“Keith! Geez, what are you doing out here? Did you already go to the party?” 

She was somewhere, just not in front of him. He did a three-sixty and found her, standing startlingly close to him. He jumped a little, and that melancholy atmosphere dissipated for a moment so he could gawk at her and dissolve into laughter. “Pidge! You made it! You—didn’t you—you had, um… _words_ , where are the _words…_ ” he rambled, clutching at her shoulders and closing his eyes as he tried to formulate the words around his tongue. 

Pidge giggled, her grin wider than ever and making her look cuter than ever. Her brunette hair was all curled up around her ears, and her bangs were clipped back by a bright purple barrette. “Geez, what’d you do without me? Where are you heading?”

“Um… the—swimming. Swimming.”

“You wanna go swimming?” she said, quirking an eyebrow up as he nodded vigorously, grabbing hold of her jean jacket with a vengeance. 

“Come with me,” he demanded.

“To go swimming? I didn’t exactly bring my swim suit—”

“Underwear.”

“Fine. Sure. Here’s to hoping they don’t kick us out,” she said with a little swing of her arms. “We’ll come back to the party after, yeah?” 

He nodded and let her lead him along. He hated the feel of her jean jacket. He was rough against his skin but he held onto it anyway, and inhaled her sweet, Skittle flavor. When it came time to cross the three-lane street, Pidge hollered at him to hurry, and the entire time he was laughing. He wasn’t sure what they were doing, but Pidge was laughing and he was laughing and it was _fun_.

“Pool!” he shouted as they got onto the side walk. He threw his arms up when he said it, and Pidge grabbed one of his arms and pulled it back down to keep him on track. She used it to haul him along. 

“We’re _getting there_. Calm yourself, child,” she chastised. “I’ve seen you drunk before—you obviously aren’t drunk right now.”

“Um… ate something—it tasted _bad_ —like… dessert but not—”

“Christ. A pot brownie? You got any left because I want in on that,” she said, nudging him playfully in the arm and completely not expecting him to produce the other half of the brownie. “Seriously? That’s all you took.”

“Yes.”

“All right. Hand her over my friend.” Keith shook the other half of the brownie out onto her open palm, and she downed it in one go. He explained that it took time for the effects to settle in, and she declared that she’d be ready for it. 

Pidge monitored Keith as they climbed the steps of the gym and scanned their student ID cards going into the workout center. She led the way to the basement where the pool was, along with the locker rooms, and she realized it’d be unfortunate to lose Keith in the men’s locker room when they separated. They only had an hour until the gym closed anyway.

“All right, I’m coming in with you. I don’t want you getting lost,” she said, but he waved her off, saying that he’d be _fine_ , don’t _worry_ about him! She merely scoffed at him, and together they found a nook in the far back of the locker room and stripped together, and stuffed their clothes into the locker Keith had at the gym. “I can’t believe you have Pokémon underwear,” she said, not at all disappointed by this fact. If Keith wasn’t completely down for the idea of swimming, he would have been embarrassed to be out in public, strutting around in his Pokémon underwear.

“And you have… a boring black bra. It’s not even lace. I’m disappointed in you,” he argued, hands on his hips.

“Bras are expensive. As if I’m gonna spend extra money on an uncomfortable, scratchy bra no one sees,” she snapped, and dragged him along to the back of the locker room, and to the door leading out to the pool.

The air was humid and damp, and smelled exactly how Keith wanted it to. He spent a few minute standing on the edge of the pool, feeling the water lap over the edges and onto his cool feet. The air was calm. No one else was swimming around this time, so it was just Keith and Pidge, on the edge of the world smelling chlorine with warm water swaying around their feet.

Keith went slow, dipping a foot in at a time and losing his mind as he lost inch after inch of skin to the water. Pidge dove straight in, glasses abandoned on the bleachers to the side. “Come on, you goofball! What are you waiting for?” she hollered, voice echoing and ringing through Keith’s head. The aroma of the words came to mind, more florescent in color than before and far more obvious—every word had a tinge to it that came off as leather upholstery, pickles, mangos and strawberries. Pidge glowed like Lance and left fuzzy images of herself behind—like greenish snapshots of Pidge’s own personal ghost following her around the pool, liquid in the water.

He was frozen in the waist-deep section of the pool, hands swaying back and forth over the surface. It was so bizarre. The sensation was all-encompassing—his skin hyper-aware of the impression the water left on his skin. It was perfect, and it smelled perfect. He felt like the _real_ Lance was there with them, even if the real Lance never knew how to swim, hated pools, and was afraid of anything to do with the ocean. 

Keith cupped the water in his hand, and marveled at it. He could hold such a limitless thing? There was too much power in this. He couldn’t contain water like this—the water probably didn’t like to be contained to begin with. Lance didn’t like the parameters. 

“What’s goin’ on? You feelin’ alright?” Pidge asked, coasting up and bounding to her feet. The water dribbled off the ends of her hair in greenish specks. She sparkled around the edges like light masked by a transparent green tupperware container.

“Lance smells like chlorine…” he said quietly, lowering his hands back down and letting the water in his hand disperse again. 

“I dunno. His cologne is more like Old Spice to be honest,” she said.

“ _No_ , but Lance smells like _chlorine_. That’s just who he is,” Keith said, bummed out because Lance was a bummer and he was an idiot for leaving Minnesota. For leaving the world. “And I can still smell it all the time because no one fucking stops talking about him…”

They were both quiet. It probably took a good five minutes for Keith to say the whole sentence anyway. So Pidge was careful as she spoke next. “So… let’s say he smells like chlorine. Is that why you wanted to come to the pool?”

He nodded, and then tipped his head to the side in thought. “But… Lance is at the apartment, so I don’t _need_ to swim. Necessarily.”

“Necessarily,” Pidge repeated. “Lance isn’t around anymore though, Keith.”

“He’s at the apartment though—”

“No… I don’t think he is,” she argued, shaking her head. “Let’s go swimming, yeah? Or did we come here just to get all depressed in the middle of the water?” 

She grabbed him by the hands, and lulled him to the deeper water until his feet left the floor, and the act of staying afloat became an art of some kind he wished to master. They spent a good thirty minutes there, and the brownie hit Pidge like a wall in that time. Her smaller body seemed to digest it faster than Keith did. He was a little clearer in the head, and just lazing around in the pool, floating on their backs, was the most relaxing thing in the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't do drugs my dudes. 
> 
> TELL ME YOUR THEORIES. I dropped a few hints in this chapter, especially when Keith's synesthesia spiked after having an edible.


	7. Preparation

When Keith got back the night of the party, his head was clearer, but Lance was so much bluer. He found Lance sprawled out on the ground with one of the spare blankets over him, and Keith wouldn’t have found it strange had he not been in a bed. Lance’s bed wasn’t around, but he was still sleeping in the spot where it used to be.

The dull light from the living room crept in when Keith nudged open the door, and shut it behind him. There was a dim glow around the entire room where Lance’s aura rippled over the ceiling and walls like light reflecting on water. It was faint, but beautiful all the same, and with Keith recovering from the night it was… calm. 

Lance turned over under the blanket and blinked up at him. “How was the party?” he asked.

“Fine,” he said. “What are you doing on the ground?”

“I just wanted to sleep by myself tonight,” he confessed with a yawn, and it wasn’t weird for him to say that. It made Keith wonder about what it’d be like actually _marrying_ someone and having to stay in the same bed all the time. On warmer nights Keith and Lance slept separately out of survival necessities and not sweating to death in the middle of the night (if that was even a thing). And sometimes, Keith thought it felt repetitive. And Lance had his own bed anyway, so it was fine.

But Lance didn’t exactly have a bed now, did he?

“Okay…” Keith said with a grimace as he shed off his slightly-damp flannel and pulled off his shirt. He flung them over his clothing rack and went to get ready for bed. When he came back, Lance was in the same place, face tucked gingerly beneath the blanket. 

Keith went over to his bed and crawled in. He laid there thinking about Lance before and Lance now. Why did it feel so weird this time? If there was a ratio between the nights they spent together versus the nights they spent separated, it’d likely be cut equally half way. It shouldn’t feel weird. 

He stared at the ceiling and remembered how Lance looked so surprised that Keith never knew about his emotional state. But Lance was happy all the time, how could he be depressed? It didn’t seem right. It seemed like a topic Lance might have broached at some point in the whole fucking year they were roommates. So he trued to think about every time Lance was a little off. It was difficult, like trying to remember a dream from a few nights ago.

Lance used to always talk about how awfully he slept at night before they started sharing a bed, and then that topic just sort of vanished because they both slept better together. Keith slept better in general when there was another person in the room—he only woke up in the middle of the night three times tops, which was a huge step up from before Lance. 

Keith turned over on his side and studied Lance, with his back turned to Keith and blanket up to his hairline. After debating it for a while, Keith nudged his blanket off and let his feet fall onto the wood. He lowered himself down to Lance, flopping his own pillow onto the ground and tugging the blanket up to lay alongside Lance on the ground.

“What are you doing?” Lance asked, and Keith hesitated at the subtle stuffiness in his voice. 

“Don’t worry about it,” he answered in a whisper. “If you look at the ceiling it’s like looking at the stars. Pretend we’re outside or something.”

Lance turned onto his back with a shaky, deflating sigh. He pulled the air back into his lungs deeply, and expelled it until he could breath evenly again and say, “You think we can camp outside and look at the stars?” 

“Hell yeah.”

Lance laughed a little, and reached his hands up over his eyes. Keith didn’t want to look, maybe because that was apparently what he’d been doing the entire year, so he forced himself to. The blue light seemed to trickle down from the corners of Lance’s eyes like a reflection, and it lingered around Lance’s eyelashes even after he pulled his hands away. “Good, because I’ve never actually camped out in the open before. My parents always made me and my siblings use a tent,” he said, and Keith turned away, swallowing down the lump in his throat. 

A while later, Keith closed his eyes and clasped his hands over his stomach so he could feel his hipbones with every exhale. He would count the times the heel of his palms dipped into that groove, and at around twenty Lance shuffled closer, tucked his face against Keith’s shoulder, and fell asleep.

  


  


Keith called his brother that morning and they talked about the road trip plans for Appleton with Hunk. Lance was there the entire time, breathing down Keith’s neck and acting like Keith wasn’t capable of talking to his own brother properly. So they settled that whole affair that day—Shiro was willing to fork over the SUV under the impression that it would help Keith’s mental state to have some closure with the McClains. Keith only hoped that much was true.

It felt weird hanging around with Lance. In all honesty, Keith _seriously_ wanted to go to the library to study, but felt bad about the fact that Lance was essentially locked in his room with nothing to do all that time. So he stuck around to keep Lance company. He was fairly positive both Michael and John were becoming concerned about whoever Keith kept locked in his room. For the most part, Lance was starting to take _that_ part seriously. Stay quiet, and then Keith would be willing to help. Or, at least, this was what Keith figured was Lance’s thought process.

He came back from clearing out his and Pidge’s plot in the greenhouse, and bumped straight into his suitcase lying open on the floor. “What the—” he started, only to realize that Lance was packing up literally _everything_ for him.

Lance was sat in the middle of a spread made entirely of Keith’s clothes. It was a patchwork, really—a quilt of Keith’s shirts and jackets, pants and shoes. They really didn’t need everything, especially when the trip would only take three days. “Why are you packing so much? You _do_ realize it’s not all going to fit in my suitcase, right?” Keith said, causing Lance to look up and beam at Keith.

“I’m just organizing everything! Your clothing rack was a mess,” he said.

“Um, no it wasn’t? You never complained about it before,” he countered, side stepping the mounds of clothes and heading around the outskirts to his bed. He dropped his backpack onto it, and it was promptly followed by his entire body. He expelled a large, worn-out sigh and felt completely and utterly… relieved. “No more classes,” he groaned into the comforter before sitting up a little turning to face Lance. 

“How was the exam?” Lance asked. “Administrative law, right?”

“Yeah. Federal and state officials can _suck my ass_. In other words I think I did pretty well,” he said, drumming his hands on the bed before nodding to Lance’s mess of clothes. “So… are we going shopping or…?”

“Oh!” Lance said, perking up instantly. “I almost forgot! I can finish this later let’s go come _on_!” All in that short span of time, Lance successfully dragged Keith off the bed and towards the door before Keith was able to get ahold of his footing and stop Lance in the process. 

“Hang on—you need a disguise,” Keith said, and Lance groaned but agreed to it.

Since everything was out in the open, he was quick in finding his leather jacket-hoodie hybrid and tossing it to Lance. It was too warm out for anything other than a hoodie, and also too bright out to be seen anywhere without sunglasses. So Keith tossed a pair of sunglasses to Lance, and wondered if that would be enough to avoid the mass majority of the university from recognizing him. 

Keith remembered the days they’d spend wandering around campus. The campus was huge to begin with, and with a total of 50k students wandering about, it was a surprise that Lance knew as many as he did. If they planned to study elsewhere, they’d end up in a huge conversation with so-and-so because they knew Lance one way or the other.

So yeah. Lance needed a disguise.

Keith checked to make sure the coast was clear out in the living room before sneaking Lance out. It was the first time he let Lance wander about here outside of getting food, using the bathroom, and all those necessary things. Evidently ghosts didn’t tend to eat according to Google, but according to Lance he did, and he also had a fully functional digestive tract. So that kind of sucked, considering Keith was hoping he wouldn’t have to cough up extra money for food. 

“ _Go, go, go_ ,” Keith hissed, pushing Lance to the door. They rushed through, and Keith slammed the door shut behind them. Lance was already halfway down the stairs when Keith turned back around. So he couldn’t really stop Lance’s initial reaction to being outside again, which involved a huge step out into the open, arms up, hollering, “ _I love the sunlight!_ ”

Keith hurried through the door and locked it behind him as Lance proceeded to twirl around the sidewalk with his arms out. “It feels so _nice out!_ I swear yesterday it was twenty below and windy!”

“A lot happens in a month,” Keith said, realizing that all Lance remembered happened before April. He tugged Lance by the sleeve of his leather jacket and said, “Come on, we’re gonna go to the Target in downtown.”

“What? Why?”

“Would you prefer we go to the express? We won’t find all of your… fruit necessities at Target Express,” he said, unfolding the list to look at it again. He never really noticed how much fruit Lance regularly ate until it all started to rot in the kitchen. Bananas, apples, grapes in the refrigerator. They never would have realized it had the fruit flies not shown up. And Keith was too preoccupied with other scents to be bothered by the smell of rotting fruit to begin with—and he didn’t expect Michael or John to pay much attention to it anyway.

Lance grudgingly agreed to the bus ride, and perked up a short while later with the prospect of spending more time out of the apartment. 

The process of getting to Target required taking the train system to downtown. Keith’s apartment was relatively far from the station, and by the time they got there, they had to stand around on the platform for a while. Lance paced back and forth over the yellow edge of the concrete that normally meant walking anywhere other than the yellow strip. Keith’s brain was starting to get used to the constant chlorine smell, but he could tell other people were a bit put off by it. There weren’t that many people by the platform, but Keith swore he saw one of them sniff the air and look in their direction.

To Keith, the smell was relatively fresh. It was clean. It was pure. It reminded Keith of the quick showers he’d take at the pool, after swimming. And the smell of it would cling to his hair even a day after. 

The train flew up in all its sleek glory, and the doors slid open. Keith pushed himself off the raised bench and wandered over to Lance, recognizing him by the black hood on his leather jacket hoodie. They both waited for the passengers to hop off, and Keith felt Lance’s hand brush against him. A moment later Lance slipped their fingers together by way of tugging Keith into the carriage and pulling him to the nearest empty seats. 

Lance kept their hands linked for the remainder of the trip, and something about it reminded Keith of how bizarre everything was about Lance. Half the time Lance didn’t even seem like the type. The type to be categorized under “romantic” or even remotely affectionate. And all the other times… he was touchy-feely and couldn’t seem to keep his hands off Keith. So in that sense, yeah, he could see why Lance and Hunk weren’t the greatest roommates. It probably helped that Keith was not only gay, but also laid back about that sort of stuff.

They got off in the city. It was windier there, and so Lance walked close enough to Keith so that their shoulders brushed against one another, and Keith could hear him humming some tune under his breath. Every now and then Keith looked over at Lance to ensure that he was still there, as if Lance was capable of vanishing. As if Lance was dependent on being a certain number of feet from the apartment—in all honesty, Keith’s anxiety spiked when he saw Lance bolt out of the apartment, as if expecting him to vanish into a cloud of blue dust the second he hit the sidewalk.

They didn’t talk much until they got to Target and set to work. Keith brought his backpack with (empty, of course) to fit in more stuff without having to carry it in his arms. Lance tugs down the hoodie as they pass the electronics section, on the way to the groceries.

“I get this feeling like… I’m afraid I might disappear,” Lance confessed, fingers clinging tightly around Keith’s as he reached over to grab a pint of orange juice from the cooler. 

“I get that feeling too,” he said.

“And I know I shouldn’t be afraid of it because I’m _dead_. Like, isn’t that what I want? But now I’m so worried…” Lance admitted, and Keith looked at him standing in the florescent light of the refrigerated section. His slim eyebrows were puckered together, and he reached his sleeve up to his chin and rubbed at it. “I know I don’t want it to be a mistake, but… what if me dying wasn’t like I expected it to be?”

Keith stayed quiet because his brain was screaming, _Of course it was a fucking mistake_ , but of course _that_ wasn’t exactly the way to tell Lance in the middle of Target. For death being such a huge commitment, it felt like Keith didn’t have the right to say anything on the matter. If he made Lance feel bad about it, what would that make him? The one who only added to Lance’s self-doubt and depression?

“What did you expect death to be like?” Keith asked, and Lance snorted and said, “Definitely not alive like this.”

He rolled his eyes and said, “Yeah, well, I don’t think you’re at all connected to your dead-self, so I don’t think this is your afterlife.”

“What do you think this is then?” Lance asked. “I’ve been wondering about it. And every time you leave me alone in our room it’s all I think about. Like, what if I disappeared and you came back and didn’t even realize anything was different? What if you forgot about me while you were gone and _poof!_ I’d just dissolve like _that_?”

“I don’t think that’s how it works,” Keith confessed. There were plenty of times throughout the day that Keith briefly forgot about Lance. Though, for the most part, his brain was entirely preoccupied by it, thinking the same questions, worrying about Lance in general. But Lance couldn’t occupy his brain _all the time_. That would be impossible—so this Lance couldn’t be dependent on that either.

“What if death wasn’t how I expected it so I came back like this? What if I regretted it?” Lance asked, drawing his hand down the side of his face.

Keith set the orange juice into the cart and shrugged. “So what? It already happened, and you don’t remember it, so I wouldn’t worry about it.”

“Okay, but _what if—_ ”

“Enough of the ‘ _what if_ ’s, okay?” Keith blurted out, exasperated. Honestly it was starting to stress him out. “We don’t have to talk about it—let’s just get the damn groceries, all right?”

“I know, but what if since I’m basically myself a month ago, what if we spend a month together and then I just disappear? Because what will happen after the point where I died?” Lance asked, and a shiver ran down Keith’s spine. He hadn’t thought of that, but then again, Lance probably had more time to think on it than _he_ did in classes and exams. It felt like, even with schoolwork no longer on his shoulders, he didn’t feel at all relieved to have exams done. Now he had to worry about this, plan a trip with Lance, and visit the McClains.

“Or… what if I never leave?” he said quietly, tugging at the jacket. “I thought about that. And I won’t age and you’ll be like _eighty_ and _die_ and I’ll just still be here—”

“Pff, we both know I won’t live past forty,” Keith snorted, and it succeeded in lightening up the mood.

Lance laughed and said, “Oh yeah, I forgot. You don’t see yourself living past forty.”

“If that’s the plan I should have started heroine yesterday or something,” he said, and Lance burst out laughing because a mother and her child just came around the corner of the isle. The woman gave them a dirty look and moved on to the next isle, leaving Keith standing there with a bright red face, and Lance trying to pull himself together. 

He elbowed Lance in the rib and moved on, and ignored the fact that Lance leaned over him and kissed him on the cheek. “You’re ridiculous,” he said, slapping Keith on the shoulder before moving away and splitting up their joined hands. 

  


  


Keith and Lance took the bus to his brother’s house. Lance had only been there once before, so he knew well enough that it was just Keith and his brother. It had been ever since his brother was eighteen and their “parents” let them move out. That tended to be the case in foster care. Keith was just thankful that he was able to stick with his brother—he’d heard stories about siblings being separated. Though, Keith was certain that if that was the case, it wouldn’t be that hard to find his brother once he got to college and had his own apartment.

His brother meant everything to him, and the fact that he was blatantly lying to his brother made his anxiety tear at the interior of his chest.

They had to walk a few blocks, so Keith left Lance by a corner store and prayed to _God_ that Lance wouldn’t disappear, especially with all the stuff he was leaving with Lance. “Don’t. Move. It’ll only be like twenty minutes or so,” Keith said, slapping his hands onto Lance’s shoulders and stressing it all the more with his firm expression. 

Lance grinned at him and leaned in quick to kiss the tip of Keith’s nose. Keith waved him off, Lance laughing like a hyena and saying, “Alright! Alright, I won’t move. Pinky promise.”

Keith slapped his hand down and rolled his eyes. “Whatever. I’ll be back in a bit. Don’t get into too much trouble.”

He turned and started heading down the street when Lance shouted back, “No promises!”

His brother’s house was among a conglomeration of others of different shapes, sizes, and combinations. It was a small townhouse with white siding and dark wooden frames on the door, the windows, and the framework of the front porch railing. Keith climbed the steps to the front door and took a peak through the living room window before knocking on the door. 

It took a minute, and another series of knocking, to get his brother’s attention.

Keith propped open the screen door when the lock came undone on the heavy dark wood door on the other side. There was an addictive tingling sensation in the back of Keith’s brain, like some scents tended to do. This one just built with the excitement at seeing his brother again. So the moment the door swung open, Keith shouted, “Shiro!” and lunged for him, and ignoring the fact that the screen door bit at his heels, and Shiro staggered under the impact.

His brother laughed and held him tight, broad arms completely enveloping Keith. He could feel Shiro’s stubble against the side of his face, and when he pulled away, Shiro was grinning at him and ruffling his hair. “Hey! What’s up? How were finals?” His voice smelled like gasoline, and normally that’d be something to stay away from, but Keith was so glad that there was a difference between Shiro’s name and real gasoline. 

Keith shrugged and stepped onto the foyer mat, saying,“I think I did all right, considering. But I don’t want to talk about finals. What have you been up to?”

Shiro nodded his head out of the room and to the kitchen, where the consistent mechanic scent fizzled away with the distinct aroma of home cooked bread just beyond the archway. Keith leaned over the threshold of the kitchen and spotted the bread maker their last guardian left to them. “It smells sweet,” Keith commented, glancing at Shiro curiously. “Why’s that?”

“Trying something new. Apparently in Italy they make bread without salt because the taxes on salt is too high, so their bread tastes sweet and goes stale really fast which is why I made it for you and Hunk to eat on the trip,” he explained, sauntering into the kitchen with a little kick in his step. He rose his eyebrows at Keith and said, “Speaking of, did he come with you?”

“Uh, no, actually. I’m going to pick him up at the house before we head out. It’s on the way out of the city so… it just worked out better,” Keith explained, wandering around the rectangular kitchen and noting the absurd about of plants on the window sill. They didn’t have many south-facing windows except for in the living room and the single one in the kitchen, so all the plants were cluttered around them. “I had to toss a bunch of the plants Pidge and I grew this semester. There’s _no_ way I’d be able to bring them all on the bus over here.”

“That sucks. It’s not like we have much room for them anyway,” Shiro said, leaning back against the counter and observing Keith as he scented the air again and wandered over to the bread maker, and then over to the garage door. 

“Is the car ready to go?” Keith asked, about to open the door, but Shiro waved him off.

“Yeah, but that can wait. It only takes, what? five hours to get to Appleton? I haven’t seen you since your last break. What’s Pidge doing for the summer?” he asked, and that was how Keith was roped into a twenty minute conversation with Shiro.

Keith couldn’t stop looking at the clock until the bread was finally done and Shiro chopped it up and stuffed it into an air-tight bag—but not until he got a slice to himself and followed Keith out to the garage. “I had to use it to tote some equipment for work, and it’s all too heavy to move out of the back. Don’t worry about that stuff, just don’t lose it,” Shiro said, and propped open the door to the back seats and tossed Keith’s backpack in.

“Okay. What’d you have to do for work?” he asked.

Shiro shrugged and said, “Parts for a machine model. When it’s done it’ll be a small replica of the final robot—you could help me out when you get back.”

“That’d be awesome,” Keith said, grinning ear to ear. Shiro matched it, and went along with the tight hug Keith sprung on him. He tucked his head against Shiro’s shoulder and said, “I’ll call you tonight, okay?”

After a moment of hesitation, Shiro agreed to it, and gave him a solid pat on the back before stepping back. Keith took the keys from him and hurried to the driver’s side. He used the extra step to vault himself onto the driver’s seat. He could see Shiro waving from the door, so he waved back before starting up the engine and going at a casual crawl out of the driveway. He was impatient and annoyed that it took a solid half hour to get out of Shiro’s house and onto the road. He probably went forty down a twenty-five road.

There was an annoying country station on the radio, so he turned it off and cursed when someone cut in cut in front of him, ignoring the intersection stop signs. “ _Moron!_ ” Keith shouted, flipping him off and taking a sharp turn down the block he left Lance on.

By some holy miracle of God, the parking spot in front of the store was empty, so he swerved into it and rolled down the window. Lance was sitting against the brick wall and sat up when Keith shouted, “Get in, loser! We’re going shopping!”

“I swear if you quote _Mean Girls_ again…” he yelled back, laughing as Keith crawled into the back seat and shoved open the side door. “What took you so damn long?”

“Sorry, I had to talk to Shiro for a bit,” Keith explained, taking one of the grocery bags from Lance’s outstretched arms, and tucking it in the far back seat. They stuffed their bags in and tucked Keith’s huge duffle behind the driver’s seat, a bag of snacks in the front console, and made room for the tent Keith ordered Shiro put in the car. It took up a good portion of the back floor.

Lance hopped into the front seat with his legs crossed and slammed the door shut. Keith crawled back up and unlocked his phone to set up the GPS. “Here—put in the address your mom sent me,” Keith said, about to hand it to Lance when his eyes flickered to the rear view mirror.

There was something obstructing his view out the back window. 

Keith spun around to look back at the familiar set of eyes staring back at him from over the back seat. He all but screamed the second she screamed too. “ _Pidge!_ What the hell?!” Keith yelled, and instantly Lance turned around to look a second before a larger, broader fellow hopped up when Pidge ducked back down.

“Aha! I _knew_ you were seeing some—” Hunk shouted, pointing his finger at them and faltering when he saw who, exactly, Keith was seeing. 

Hunk stared down Lance, and in the dark of the truck, it really should have been difficult to see how pale Hunk got. It really should have been difficult to see the horror on his face. Both Lance and Hunk shrieked at each other, and Hunk fell forward over the back seat, legs kicking up agains the back window until he flopped onto the cushions, and Lance kicked the passenger door open.

Lance took off almost as fast as it took Pidge to weasel the truck door open and burst out after him. “Holy shit! Wait a second— _get back here, you heathen!_ Who are you?! What are you doing with Keith?!” 

Keith was still staring at Hunk recovering and rubbing at his head, looking completely sick to his stomach. “I-I think I might—” Hunk started, lurching forward and slapping his hands over his mouth. He dove for the nearest door and opened it just in time to slosh vomit onto the asphalt, and send a car swerving on the road to avoid hitting the open door. 

_Well shit_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! Spring break is upon me! I plan to write a lot hopefully, so keep a look out! In the meantime you can find me on [Tumblr](http://gurlskylark.tumblr.com/) :D


	8. Best Laid Plans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter ended up being shorter than intended, but by all means please enjoy this extended conversation :)

“Let me get this straight: so you _lied_ to me to get the SUV, and take it on a road trip across the country, with… Lance?” Shiro said, pacing the living room carpet and brushing his hands through his hair. “And on top of it, you _used Hunk_ to do so, and failed to mention that you’ve been hallucinating? And you haven’t been to a doctor?”

Keith groaned and dragged his hands over his face before slapping them down on his legs and saying, “I’m _not_ hallucinating. If I am, then you guys wouldn’t be able to see Lance.”

It seemed like everyone aside from Keith was avoiding the obvious, and pointedly sitting as far from Keith and Lance as possible. Hunk was on the armchair opposite them, his legs pulled up to his chest and his eyes never leaving Lance. It had been an entire fiasco getting everyone to calm the fuck down and get in the damn SUV, where Pidge demanded Keith steer the vehicle straight back to Shiro’s house where it came from. 

So they were here, trying to extract some sliver of logic in this mess.

“Yes, but he smells like _chlorine_. Obviously this has something to do with you, unless I don’t know you at all,” Shiro said, and at this Lance looked away from Hunk for the seconds it took to say, “What do you mean I smell like chlorine?”

“It smells like a goddamn swimming pool in here,” Pidge said, and then glared at Keith, “What were you talking about last night? With Lance smelling like chlorine?”

Keith stared at her for a moment before looking at Shiro, who shrugged, arms folded resolutely over his chest. He didn’t want to be apart of this shit show any more than Keith did. So Keith sighed again and said, hands over his eyes, “I have synesthesia. It’s a neurological condition that causes some of your senses to flip. I associate names and people with smells, and… Lance smells like chlorine.”

He slapped his hands down and glowered at the ground. His set his jaw tight, and was annoyed that he ever had to say anything to them. So he saw the word differently than them, big whoop. Everyone saw the world differently, so he wasn’t anything special in that sense. And yet, he heard plenty of stories about people obsessing over it, changing they way they interacted with synesthetes. 

So he wasn’t all surprised when instantly Pidge said, “Wait—so what do I smell like? And Hunk and Shiro? Are you able to hear in colors and stuff too?”

“That’s so cool,” Hunk gawked. “How long have you had it?”

“It’s something you’re born with,” Shiro said, filling in the gaps Keith left open. “But a lot of the times you don’t realize it’s anything different until you start talking about it. When we were younger, my scent changed and he brought it up. You were about nine, right?”

“No, I think I was ten,” Keith said, pinching his fingers over his lip and then chewing on his fingernail. “I can’t even remember what you were before.”

“Wait, so what’s my scent?” Pidge demanded, crawling closer across the couch. “Is it just when you’re super close to someone? Like a proximity thing?”

“No…” Keith drawled, looking at her weirdly from the corner of his eye. “It’s just a word association thing. I think ‘Pidge’ and I smell Skittles. Hunk is pineapples and Shiro’s gasoline.”

Hunk gasped a little, murmuring, “Pineapples…?” in an oddly perplexed sort of way. Pidge was still staring at Keith with her wide doe eyes, at least until she remembered who was sitting on Keith’s other side, quietly observing the exchange.

Lance broke his silence by saying, “Well you conveniently failed to mention that. Why chlorine?” 

“Can’t you read his thoughts though…?” Pidge asked skeptically, tipping her head back and narrowing her eyes at Lance. She pushed back onto her heels, hand over her chin. “Since Keith essentially created you?”

Lance glared at her, saying, “ _No_ , of course I can’t! I’m not a ghost or whatever. I don’t even feel any different. I didn’t even know anything weird was going on until Keith flipped out. I was just trying to have a good time and find my phone.”

Keith looked at him, and then over to where Shiro was staring at them both and wondering just how sane any of them were. It wasn’t every day dead people came back to life, or manifested into a physical form via… Keith’s state of mind. For a moment, everyone fell quiet as they processed the physical elephant in the room, and acknowledged its existence with a stronger realization than before. Now they weren’t all just thinking about Lance, but seeing him as well.

Eventually, Shiro stepped closer and knelt down in front of Keith and Lance. He sat on the edge of the coffee table and touched a hand to Lance’s knee. “These look like Keith’s jeans,” he commented.

“I don’t exactly have any clothes anymore— _wait_. I mean, I _had_ clothes when I showed up but—I mean, it’s not like a popped up out of nowhere _naked_ or anything like that,” Lance blurted out, ears going red as Shiro leant back with a laugh, glancing over at where Hunk huffed and murmured, “Yeah, that sounds like Lance.”

Lance breathed in for a second, calming down, before saying, “Look—I get what happened and I really shouldn’t be here, which is why I told Keith to keep it a secret. He and I both agreed that we shouldn’t drag you guys into it especially after everything that happened. So it’s not entirely Keith’s fault that he lied—I told him to, and I suggested we use your SUV it wasn’t him.

“He was just going along with what I told him. And—wait, I _swear_ it isn’t like I pressured him into it. He didn’t want to at first but I convinced him and we were gonna make a road trip out of it so it’s not just me using him or anything I swear. If I had money I’d pay you back for gas and stuff and we won’t trash your SUV,” he went on with hardly a breath between sentences until Shiro silenced him with a wave of his hand. 

“I appreciate that,” Shiro started, and there was an unfortunate drift to it that ended with, “ _but_ , I can’t let you two go all the way to _Oregon_ on your own. Did you even plan this through at all? Where will you be staying?”

“We did plan most of it, and we’ll be staying at truck stops,” Keith murmured, twisting his hands between his knees. “Lance made an itinerary and everything. It’s in the car.”

Shiro stared at them, and then again at Pidge and Hunk who were watching from opposite sides of the room, unsure what to do. What _could_ they do, especially when their friend was planning a road trip with a deceased person? 

Eventually, Shiro pegged his eyes on Keith and shook his head, “I can’t let you go on this trip all on your own.”

“But I _won’t_ be alone,” Keith argued, voice stressed. “Lance may be fucking dead, but the Lance that’s _here_ is _real_ and you can’t just ignore that. You make it sound like he doesn’t exist—he isn’t a _fucking_ hallucination—”

“Keith, I’m not saying that, all I’m saying is that—”

“That what? I’m not capable of taking care of myself for a few days? If it’s the driving you’re worried about, then—then even if Lance can’t drive, in case you can’t remember, I got a perfect score on my driver’s exam, you know,” he said. “And we’ll just be using the extra money from my saving’s account, and I’ll pay it back! I’ll see if that position at the cafe is still open from last summer—”

“I _am_ worried about that, but I’d feel more comfortable if I came with you,” his brother said, which completely floored Keith. He hadn’t even considered that an option, especially with Shiro’s work. “It’d be safer if you had someone else to drive once in a while. With that distance I’m guessing it’ll take a few days of constant driving, right?”

Keith stammered for a second, and looked at Lance, who looked back at him and then at Shiro. “Well, what about your job?” Lance asked.

“I have two weeks vacation time. And I could do some of it off of my laptop whenever we get wifi,” he suggested.

“Wait—you’re serious about this?” Hunk said to Shiro. “You’re just gonna let them visit _Lance’s family_ right after their _son_ committed _suicide_ —and I’m sorry Lance, but you seriously can’t _do that to them_. And I—I don’t know how this works, but y-you are _seriously_ in the wrong here for putting Keith through that.”

“I don’t know how it works either, but I didn’t come home to the apartment knowing that I was actually _dead_ , okay? So it wasn’t on purpose,” Lance insisted sharply, but the second he pegged his eyes on Hunk, Hunk turned away, face pale, and eyes glossy and wide. 

“But I—I feel like it _is_ on purpose wh-when you want to go across the fucking country to visit your grieving parents,” Hunk said, voice quiet. 

At that, Lance leant back into the couch and dragged his hands over his face. He sighed and said, “I don’t plan on talking to them or anything. I just—I need to _see_ them. And then maybe I’ll just… go away? I don’t know how this works but I _need_ to see them or else _I don’t know_. I feel like I… can’t move on until I go home.”

“But your home is in Appleton,” Hunk argued. “The fact that your family moved doesn’t mean—”

“It _does_ though. I don’t care about the house,” he snapped. “It isn’t about material _bullshit_ , okay? When I’m homesick it isn’t like I’m missing the goddamn kitchen at home or something. I just want to see my mom and dad sometime soon. I can’t wait until—until—until—”

Lance was relatively still that entire time, and when the glitch started, it only seemed to effect the lids of his eyes and the movement of his lips and tongue. The sight of it startled Shiro away, and Pidge leaned over Keith and said, “Jesus, what just happened?”

“Wait—” Hunk said, frowning at the frozen, shimmering figure of Lance on the couch. He got up slowly, eyes narrowing skeptically. “Hang on—that was a _complete_ deja vu moment.”

“What do you mean?” Pidge asked.

“He repeats some things he’s said before,” Keith explained, nibbling on his thumbnail and looking up at the shock in Hunk’s face. “But I thought it was just conversations I’ve had with him—he brought up something from the beginning of the year a few days ago.”

“Lance talked about wanting to go home a month ago, before… you know,” Hunk said, folding his arms over his chest. Shiro paced towards the living room window, far from them, and seemed to only watch Lance because it was difficult to look away. “How long does… this last?”

As soon as Hunk said it, Lance came back into clarity in the middle of, “—can’t move on until I go home, you know?”

Lance looked at all of them as if nothing had changed, hands hidden between his knees and concern hitching when he realized everyone was staring at him. “What is it? Do I have something on my face?” he asked, reaching his fingers up to graze his cheek.

Shiro turned away with a hand over his mouth, and stared out the windows until Hunk hunkered down onto the coffee table and asked, “So… what all does he remember? Did he talk to you about… the whole—?” 

It took Keith a second to catch on, but no more than that because his fight with Lance was always in the back of his mind somewhere, like acknowledging their scents in the room. “No, he doesn’t remember. He can’t remember anything in the previous month.”

“What am I supposed to remember?” Lance asked, frowning at Hunk, who looked more or less uncomfortable with this entire exchange. 

Hunk shook his head, combing his fingers over his cropped black hair. When he turned away, Keith noted the gentle slope of his nose, to the curve of the tip dipping in just above his heavy lips. He vaguely remembered a conversation that smelled like honey—anything to do with mustaches smelled like honey—where Lance practically force-shaved Hunk because his mustache was an embarrassment to the fraternity. It’d been nearly two weeks since Lance died, and Hunk was starting to let his five o’ clock shadow turn into a full mustache and beard. 

“Keith?” Lance demanded, leading Keith to blink rapidly and turn to him. He realized that his eyes were starting to burn again, so he rubbed the back of his palm over his eyes before answering.

“I mentioned it already. We got into a fight and Hunk came in near the end of it,” he explained, eyes going over to where his brother was standing away from them. Shiro had his thinking stance going on—one arm cupped over his stomach, the other raised up so his hand could cover his mouth. Keith remembered when he adopted that stance, and how it came from anxiety and worry over everyday things. Normally Shiro was resistant to the adolescent chemical imbalance that is acne, but in high school he couldn’t seem to stop touching his face out of stress and ended up breaking out only around his chin.

It was bizarre because Keith rarely thought about younger Shiro. It just seemed like… they completely grew out of those days, and yet Shiro turned back around and looked like he was a teenager again.

“We’re going to try it,” Shiro said with a deep intake of breath, and a shaky exhale. “And I’m only doing this because it’s not logical keeping Lance around when he’s already died. He doesn’t… _exist_ anymore, and if this doesn’t work then… I don’t know what else to do. People who die aren’t supposed to come back—we don’t exactly have a _protocol_ for this.”

At this, Lance ducked his head down and picked at a worn spot in the jeans Keith gave him. Keith nodded in understanding to Shiro, and found Pidge looking like she had something to say on the matter. Probably an argument, if Keith knew anything about her. 

“Wait a second—so you guys are gonna go on a road trip _without me?_ ” she said. “And Keith’s a fucking synesthete and Lance is a ghost and you expect me to just sit around in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere in _northern Minnesota_ while you guys go on an adventure? Let me see this fucking itinerary, it better be color coded.”

“It is! I used all the colors I could find in Keith’s pencil bag,” Lance said, lunging up off the couch and over the back of it on his way to the garage door. Keith was about to stop him, but Lance was already out the door and heading for the SUV.

So Keith turned back around to peg Pidge with a glare. “You can’t come with us. What are you gonna tell your parents?”

She shrugged, one hand slung over the back of the couch as she said, “I dunno. I don’t think they’d mind me taking a week vacation with some friends. I think they’re worried about whether or not I even _have_ friends, so they’d be ecstatic if I’m being completely honest. And… I dunno about paying you guys back. I’m kinda poor as it is, but I could at least pay for my own meals and stuff.”

“I have that VISA from my parents,” Hunk said, which led Pidge to gasp in remembrance of it. It was the reason they were even able to pay for that entire cake from the sorority charity event. “I mean, I’ve already used a bit of it, but there’s still at least two-seventy on it. And since they gave it to me because I wasn’t able to make the funeral, I think it’d… be fitting to use it for Lance’s sake.”

Keith blinked at him in astonishment. He’d completely forgotten about Hunk’s parents being dicks for not letting him come home for the funeral—and by default he’d forgotten about the debit card stocked full of several hundreds. He then looked up at his brother, who remained impassive about the revelation. “I can’t ask you to spend all your money on this trip,” he told Hunk.

“But I don’t want to use it for anything else. It’s just—shitty money my parents gave me because they _felt_ bad. And they won’t care where I go over break so long as I warn them ahead of time,” Hunk said, glancing at Pidge and Keith before adding, “I want to come with you guys, if that’s all right.”

They could hear Lance coming back in and slamming the garage door shut behind him. Keith was still staring at Hunk, and he shrugged, saying, “I’m cool with that. Shiro?”

“Fine. And Pidge can come as well.”

Pidge threw her fists into the air, yelling, “ _Yes!_ ” just as Lance hopped back onto the couch and said, “What’d I miss?”

  


  


Pidge’s parents were coming down from Duluth, Minnesota to help collect her things from the dorm. Lance stuck around Shiro’s house while the rest of them helped the Holts carry boxes down from the third floor of the dorm building Pidge was in. It only took two trips, which was an absolute miracle—but then again, most of the weight came from her computer setup. 

She rearranged some of her things to pack a bag for the trip. Hunk ran off down the road to Kappa Sigma to pick up a bag of his things before they all took off on the road. Keith came back down with her to find Shiro talking with her parents about the trip, promising that he’d be “the responsible adult” and make sure none of them died or anything to that effect. Keith recalled the smell of Ajax coming from her brother, and pegged his name to be Matthew. Shiro used Ajax to clean every now and then—that’s what gave it the clean house smell Keith found refreshing. 

Matthew came up to them and squeezed Pidge into a tight hug. He was older, and happened to be an alumni of the school like Shiro was. They could have been twins had Pidge not carried over her mom’s curly hair trait. “Officially a _sophomooore!_ ” Matthew shouted, swinging her back and forth. 

Pidge giggled, letter her feet sweep off the ground for a second before she staggered back into place. “Not really! I still have all summer to get through!” she argued, screaming against his chest when he continued to sway back and forth with her in his arms. Keith laughed from the sidelines, folding his arms over his chest just as he realized Mrs. Holt was coming over to talk to him.

“Keith, how are you holding up?” she asked, reaching an arm out and rubbing her hand up and down his back. It was such a motherly action, and happened to bring about a tinge of minty toothpaste in the back of his mind. 

“I’ve been better,” he confessed with a soft smile, knowing exactly what she, and everyone else, was hinting at. “But I’m really excited for this trip. I think it’ll be fun.”

She gave him a gentle squeeze before pulling back, folding her arms over her chest. It was warm out, but they were standing in the shadows of the dorm building, so the chill made it less appropriate to be wearing sweatshirts and shorts. “Well, I’m excited for all of you. It will be a great experience, and something to take your mind off things, huh?” she commented, her warm smile crinkling her eyes at the corners. Keith returned the smile, and accepted a hug from her before she went over to say goodbye to Pidge.

Shiro came over to Keith and gave him an affectionate hair-ruffle. Keith shook him off and reached back to readjust his bun. The Holts were mingling over by the car, saying their goodbyes to Pidge and practically writing down a list of things she should look out for. They watched the Holts for a moment before Shiro said, “I wish you would have told me about Lance sooner. I could have helped you.”

“Yeah, well… you’re helping now, I guess,” he muttered under his breath. Shiro’s hand came around to his opposite shoulder, and gave him a squeeze. Keith leaned into it, and looked up at his brother, and the cheeky grin on his lips. Shiro’s short black hair was framed in a quiff over his forehead, jet black and reminiscent of the way they were both forced to wear their hair as kids. They practically looked like twins if their hair happened to function the same way. 

“It’s been a while since we went on a road trip.”

“Yeah, because all the other times we were with our parents,” Keith complained with a roll of his eyes. It was easiest to call them parents—they happened to group all their foster parents, and adoptive parents in that category. “I sorta wish we could have gone on that West Coast trip with just the two of us.”

“Who knows—maybe after we get to Oregon we could drive down the coast.”

“Yeah, maybe if you wanted to quit your job and spend a month on the road,” Keith laughed, nudging Shiro playfully in the side before stepping away. “Let’s get to the car, yeah?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think this is the shortest chapter I've ever posted on AO3. I'm usually always between 4k and 6k WHO SAID ANYTHING ABOUT 3K ?? So my apologies for being a failure. Maybe tomorrow will be a better writing day. But remember those days last month when I wrote 10k a day? Who is that woman and where did she go?
> 
> IT SNOWED LIKE 15" TODAY ISN'T IT, LIKE, MARCH ?? I can't believe this weather. What a wild time to be a live. I took [a good picture of my pupper](http://i.imgur.com/P4LElKO.jpg) today though, so it all worked out.


	9. Thanks For Visiting Minnesota

Lance and Keith spent a lot of time together. Just simply listing the number of movies they watched together would gather about a hundred hours to their time commitment. And if a relationship stemmed from a certain number of hours together, they could easily be categorized as boyfriends—but that just wasn’t how relationships worked. It was far more complicated than just spending time with the person—an unfortunate realization that Keith didn’t exactly get in on.

He never really categorized Lance as a “boyfriend”, exactly. Their relationship was bizarre to begin with, and he was never really bothered by the amount of times Lance went home with someone else at a party, or spent the night at his friend’s apartment on the outskirts of campus. At least, Keith _told_ himself he wasn’t bothered by it. 

They came as a pair. They went to parties together, to festivals together, to clubs together. Lance would come to the business management school events just because he wanted an excuse to wear a suit and tie, and wear it next to Keith. Keith would always roll his eyes whenever Lance came to the events Keith volunteered at or spoke at. Most of them involved talking to freshmen thinking about coming to the school—evidently Keith was a good rep for the management school, so he did it for a job some days, volunteered on others. His tuition was paid for considering his and Shiro’s situation, and his grades in high school, but that didn’t mean Keith’s apartment was paid for. 

“I’m _literally_ just going to get my essay shit on by professionals—you don’t have to come,” Keith told Lance as he got up to get dressed for the session. Lance hopped up with him, and went to his dresser—next to his desk— to pull out a fresh pair of trousers. 

“As if I’m gonna miss you get torn to pieces,” he laughed, and Keith glared at him from over his shoulder before turning back to his side of the room and shrugging off his sweatpants in reluctant favor of slacks. He reached back and grabbed the hem of his shirt, yanking it up over his head the second he heard a distinct and obnoxiously familiar _click_ go off. 

He yanked his shirt all the way off after a quick second _click_ and turned to glare at Lance, who had his camera up for shits and giggles—and _damn_ was he giggling like mad. Lance lowered his Canon down, and scrunched up his nose like he did when he planned on challenging Keith in one way or another. 

“You totally just took a picture of me stripping,” Keith accused.

Lance swayed his hips and gave an innocent shrug, pursing his lips crookedly and saying, “You aren’t wrong…” 

Keith rolled his head back with a groan. “Please delete it. I swear if that shows up on Facebook or something…”

“It won’t! I promise,” he said, clasping his hands together in a praying motion. “Don’t make me.”

“The way you’re looking at me suggests you _want_ me to make you,” Keith argued, stepping up to Lance’s bed that separated them. He leaned over it, pressing his hands into the patterned quilt, saying, “Are you going to delete them, or do I have to?”

Lance leaned over the bed, practically nose-to-nose with Keith, his camera swinging between them. “ _Make_ me,” he hissed devilishly, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.

Unlike Lance, Keith was a seasoned athlete. He was in track, swam through middle school, and took up yoga for the sake of shaving his stress away stretch-by-stretch. His reflexes were good, so Lance hadn’t expected him to snatch the camera so easily, or swing it off Lance’s neck in a matter of seconds. 

Lance’s hand went for his arms, and dragged him face-down onto the quilt. Keith held onto the lens and twisted, elbowing Lance in the side and pushing his face away with one free hand. “Don’t hurt my camera—!” Lance whined, shoving his face against Keith’s hand to get at the camera. He went for Keith’s weak spot—his ticklish sides—and sent Keith doubling over with a shout of protest. There were some people who could contain their laugher and screams, and Keith just wasn’t one of them.

He dropped the camera down to slap Lance away, forcefully grabbing at his fingers and twisting them back. “Ow—ow, ow, _ow!_ ” he cried out, so Keith dropped his hand. Not even a second later, Lance darted out and snatched the camera back, rolling over Keith and landing on the other side of the bed. “Aha! It’s mine!”

Keith groaned as he flopped onto his back and complained, “Come on… I need to get dressed…”

“ _You’re_ the one who decided to steal my camera,” he said pointedly, twisting around to face Keith, camera held back with the strap wrapped around his wrist. “What time’s the session at?”

“Two, and it takes twenty minutes to walk there,” Keith said, sitting up again and going for his shirt. Lance stepped to the side, observing as Keith swept his arms through the sleeves. He met Lance’s gaze and raised his eyebrows. “Are you coming or not? Free food and stuff. Get dressed.”

At the mention of free food, Lance’s motivation spiked and he abandoned his camera briefly to pull on khakis and button up a black dress shirt. He was one polo away from looking like an _actual_ frat boy, Keith realized, and snickered at the sight of it. But then Lance slung on a tie and the image was ruined forever. “Dude, come on. You look like a basic white guy now,” Keith complained.

“But I’m not white.”

“Yeah, but your outfit is. Lose the tie—”

“But isn’t it formal—!”

“I’m not gonna wear a tie! You aren’t even a part of the session so it doesn’t even matter.”

“Then stop complaining. I’m wearing the tie,” Lance decided, and playfully snapped his belt in Keith’s direction before looping it through his pants and securing it in the front. By that point Keith had his blazer on and finished the look with his dress shoes. Before leaving, Lance yanked Keith back to their floor length mirror and held up his camera again. 

Keith rolled his eyes, and was caught in the middle of it by the camera’s _click_. “We look killer. Check us out,” Lance said, holding out the camera despite the fact that they were _standing in front of the mirror_. 

“Oh my God, we need to go—”

“Don’t forget your portfolio,” Lance said, and Keith’s heart nearly stopped. How could he forget the one thing that had his essay in it? He darted back to his desk to grab it, hearing Lance head for the door with a little laugh in his voice as he added, “Aren’t you glad I pay attention? Now come on, we’re gonna be late.”

  


  


“We’re so behind schedule,” Keith sighed from the passenger’s seat, his feet kicked up on the dash despite Hunk’s _many_ safety warnings. In the case of a car crash, evidently this was a sure fire way of getting his legs snapped in two. 

But he didn’t really give two shits about his two halves of a leg.

“We’ll catch up. Just tell Mrs. McClain we’ll be a day late,” his brother suggested. That just made Keith sigh louder. “Look—it’ll be fine. If you want we could add an extra two hours to the travel time each day.”

“Lance factored in a break day at Yellowstone. We could just skip Yellowstone,” Hunk suggested, only to be gasped at by Pidge.

“Are you kidding?! As if I’m going to miss out on the chance to see the source of humanity’s demise!” she all but shouted. “Also, can someone crack open a window back here? _Shiro_ the windows are locked! Do you have me on child safety or something? I may be five two but that doesn’t mean—”

“It was an accident! Sorry Pidge,” Shiro said, and a moment later a whirl of wind swept through the backseat, and blew baby hairs into Keith’s face. He licked his lips and sputtered on a strand of it, clawing at his cheek to get it out of his mouth. 

“Humanity’s demise is obviously going to be overpopulation,” Lance said, voice farther away now with the wind current as a buffer between the front seat and the far back. “Also, I know for a fact that opening the windows happens to be an insult to my beautiful chlorinated perfume.”

“If perfume was chlorinated, you’d be dead,” Pidge snapped. “And yes, I may or may not have the biggest goddamn migraine from your body odor. Why’d you have to pick chlorine, Keith?”

“It’s not my fault. And also, I deal with it every day so you shouldn’t really be talking,” Keith said with a wave of his hand to the bucket seat where Pidge was perched, legs crossed. He glanced back at her, lifting his sunglasses to say, “Besides, you’re not the one dealing with a constant shit storm of Skittles, gas, pineapples, and chlorine, now are you?”

She scowled at him, but the idea of it fascinated her too much to be angry with it. “Wait, so what about you? What do you smell like?”

“I don’t think about my name too often,” he confessed, settling back to face the front. “But it’s just water. Nothing special.”

“So we’re all special?” Hunk asked. “Aw, that’s sweet.”

“And for the record, you two knuckleheads smell like a breakfast cereal when you’re together,” Keith said, and Pidge laughed and reached out to high five Hunk. 

As they geeked out over the fact that they made a great breakfast team together, Shiro glanced briefly over at Keith before saying, “Looks like you’re having fun talking about it now, huh?” It just earned him a punch in the arm that was purposefully painful, and played off as a “Punch buggy green no tag backs.” 

Hunk rolled down his window, and Shiro did the same so he could sling his arm over the open ledge. The music they were playing became drowned out by the wind coursing through the SUV, so Keith joined the party and tilted his head to look out the window. It wasn’t much of a surprise out there—it was still just Minnesota, but it was different from California road trips so he appreciated the greenery, and the flatter, rolling hills. 

Spring made the trees all the more green—a more vibrant shade, perhaps because the sky was a mix of heavy clouds between grayish skies. It did little to mute the colors, and instead added a damp mix to the air that was fresh on Keith’s skin. It clung to his bare arms and turned them cold, and his fingertips turned red the longer he held them out against the window ledge. He pulled his arm in and tucked his hands between his thighs, and saw through the side mirror that Hunk was turned away from the window, talking to Lance. He couldn’t even hear them. 

There was this… bizarre occurrence that was starting to happen that was gradually becoming easier for Keith to nail down, and secure properly. It was fleeting, like the mess that was Keith’s thoughts on a regular basis. Despite its ethereality, it lingered around like a shadow on the wall. This was Lance as he knew now. This was the unreality of Lance McClain post Lance McClain. 

It was extraordinary and entirely offbeat. This wasn’t how life was supposed to go. None of them should be given this experience, and yet… somehow Lance—or perhaps _Keith_ —made it possible. Some part of it seemed to divine to be _human_ even. This couldn’t be something Keith was capable of. He shouldn’t _have this ability_ to bring Lance back when Lance never wanted him around—

In the week without Lance, Keith thought about those nights Lance spent away from Keith. He thought about the people Lance spent time with aside from him, and the nights he didn’t even spend in the apartment. He thought about how Lance was never meant to be his, and it was just… a _thought_. But the thought had substance and _backing_ like a name with a smell. There was a foundation to whatever the fuck they were, and somehow he never thought to consider why Lance would play with his emotions like that if he didn’t mean at least _some_ part of it.

Keith nudged his sunglasses a little to make sure they were covering his most likely red, bloodshot eyes. He was starting to feel like before, with the constant tug in the back of his throat that was somehow linked to the tightness of his eyes, and the ache in his chest. He sniffed a little, and breathed in sharply. The wind covered the sound of it, but he still felt it.

It was getting dark pretty fast, considering they left at around dinner time and planned to eat later. They also planned to drive into the night, until they reached their first stop in Aberdeen. It’d take four hours, and with the fading sun they hit the South Dakota border by the golden hour. 

“Passing Ortonville,” Pidge declared as they drove beside the Ortonville population sign.

“Orton Hears A Who.”

“Don’t you dare, Lance,” she hissed, and they could hear the incessant giggling in the back seat in full clarity now that the majority of the windows were closed. 

Shiro kept his window open, and would push his elbow up onto it and nibble on his thumb nail as they crossed through the main street of the town. “Sweet, no toll,” he commented.

“Oh shit, right. What are we gonna do about toll roads?” Hunk asked, and Keith shrugged and looked to his brother. 

“I mean, there aren’t any in Montana and Wyoming as far as I know,” Shiro said. “Did we go through one that time we went to Washington?” 

“I don’t think so…” Keith started, “but I think there might be one in state that we don’t have to worry about? But tolls are nothing compared to paying for gas so I think we’ll be okay.”

He heard something crinkling behind him, so he turned just as a sheet of paper snapped straight between Lance’s extended arms, and he flattened it against the back of Hunk’s seat. “I say we don’t use a GPS. It’ll be more exciting if we use a real map,” he said.

“Is that what you were riffling around for at the gas station?” Pidge asked, and he hummed his affirmation. “Unbelievable. We _aren’t_ using a paper map.”

“Too bad. _Ooh!_ Look, there’s a town called Mansfield. Can we go there and see if there’s a Jane Austen exhibit?” he asked, and Hunk laughed and said something like, “Maybe we could find a school for disreputable girls and drop Pidge off there.”

Pidge stared at him for a moment before saying, “I will cut you.”

Keith laughed, pulling his knees up and dropping his feet down to the floor. He twisted around to face them just as Lance flicked Pidge on the side of the head, and struck up a full-on war with her. She scrambled out of her seatbelt and lunged to the back, tackling Lance down and grabbing at his shirt. He shrieked and twisted back, howling with laugher when she went for his sides and tickled him to death. 

With all the commotion, it got hot in the SUV _fast_ , so the put down the windows again while Pidge dropped back, and screamed when she miscalculated and ended up falling off the seat. She slipped between the two bucket seats, and Hunk held her up by the back of her shoulders to keep her from hitting her head. 

The first few hours of the trip were exciting because everyone was actually _awake_. It took about another thirty minutes for everyone to calm down, but by that point they were close enough to Aberdeen that taking a nap was useless, and it was too dark to read. Keith sat with his head tipped back against the seat, and watched the street lights glide overhead, and glisten over the windshield. He could see Hunk through the side mirror, with his arm propped up against the open window, and his chin resting against it. His hair was slicked back from the wind.

It was quiet except for the faint music in the background, and the sudden _thud_ of the tires going off the main street and into a parking lot. That seemed to wake them all up from their individual trances.

“Okay, we’re here,” Shiro announced. “There was a pizzeria down the street. We could order something there.”

“I’m starving,” Pidge moaned, slouching in her seat with a grumble, her hands folded over her stomach, and her heavy head of brunette hair hitching up on the upholstery. 

“How far?” Keith asked. “I wasn’t paying attention.”

“About a block down the road. You guys wanna walk?” Shiro asked, twisting back to look at everyone in the SUV. 

Keith shrugged, Hunk shrugged, Pidge shrugged, so Lance said, “Sure, we can walk.”

Everyone got out and Keith’s legs were sort of asleep so he wobbled a little and pointedly slapped Lance’s hands away when he went to grab Keith around the waist. He glared at Lance as he linked his hands together in front of him, and stretched his arms out and up. “I can see your stomach,” Lance commented blatantly, so Keith dropped his arms back down and slouched his shoulders down.

Hunk was already out there with them, since he exited the same side of the SUV as them, and punched Lance in the shoulder for the comment. Lance yelped and rubbed his arm, frowning like some beautiful, wide-eyed puppy. “Ouchie, don’t hit me,” he whined.

The sight of it led Hunk to hesitate, and a look of raw regret registered in an instant. “Oh geez, sorry! Shit, please forgive me, dude.” Hunk reached out his arms to Lance, circling him into a hug that Lance reluctantly gave into for a few seconds before dropping his arms and attempting to pull away. Hunk refused to let go until Pidge and Shiro emerged from the other side of the vehicle, and even then he was hesitant. He straightened out Lance’s shirt for him before stepping back fully, and looking more or less dazed.

Keith didn’t really blame Hunk at all for the misstep. He felt that way plenty of times, wondering whether or not he should act any differently around Lance McClain post Lance McClain. He had a feeling Hunk knew about Lance’s mental state before the incident, but either way it was… easy to remember the recent past where Lance no longer existed.

But that didn’t necessarily mean Lance felt the same about it, considering he didn’t remember dying. 

Lance went along with it though—the sort of thing he did. He laughed it off and shoved Hunk a little saying, “Thanks for the bearhug, but we should probably get going. Pizzeria’s this way, right?” He jabbed his thumb in the direction going east down the road, twisting on his heels to head in that direction before Shiro even confirmed it. Either way, that was the way they’d go, and follow after Lance for as long as it took for him to keep up that pace.

He quickly slowed down, skimming past Hunk and Pidge, and Shiro, before settling in step with Keith. “Can I see your phone?” Lance asked, and Keith narrowed his eyes pointedly at him. Lance rolled his eyes, and said, “Oh come on, I’m not gonna go on your Facebook again. How are you still bitter about that?”

“I got approximately three messages from your friends asking if I was all right,” Keith deadpanned. “I don’t even know them. I’m not even friends with them on Facebook.”

“Making your friendships online official isn’t necessary, okay? And I’m sure you knew them—”

“Yeah, maybe I met them _once_ at a party,” he argued, mumbling it under his breath. 

He reached into his pocket anyway, but left it there, and waited for Lance’s explanation. It came soon enough, mostly out of impatience. “ _Fine_. I just want to take a picture. You look cute, and also I want to see if I’m like a vampire and you can’t see me in photographs,” Lance confessed, holding his hand out for the phone.

Keith sighed and slapped it into his palm. A moment later Lance had the camera up and they could see themselves washed over in shadows until they passed under a streetlight. The road was all orange from the tungsten, and the shop lights left a bluish, pink haze over their skin. And Lance wasn’t a vampire after all.

“See? Cute,” he said, and snapped the picture. Keith blinked for a moment afterwards, observing Lance as he double checked the picture before going back to the camera setting. “Hang on—I’m gonna go take a pic with Hunk.”

He ran up ahead and cruised past Shiro, lunging for Hunk’s back at lightning speed. He swung his arms around Hunk’s neck, and held the phone out far. Out of habit, it seemed, Hunk clung onto Lance’s legs to keep him from slipping, and it was such a hilarious sight that Keith couldn’t quite contain his laughter. Hunk was a big guy to begin with, but with Lance being a lanky beanpole—all legs and arms—it was almost like a spider jumped onto his back. 

“You know you can’t keep those pictures,” Shiro’s voice sounded quietly beside him—ever the voice of reason.

“I know,” he sighed. “But Lance takes so many pictures to begin with—and he doesn’t _have_ anything right now, least of all his _camera—_ ”

“I know that. But if people put a date to these pictures, or they end up… on the internet or _Facebook_ or _whatever_ …” Shiro started, watching him watch Lance, Hunk, and Pidge band together for a photograph. Between the frame of Lance’s extended arm, and Hunk’s head of black hair, they could see all three of their smiling faces on the phone screen, and the fact that Pidge was flipping off the camera with her middle finger pushing up her glasses. “Just… be careful, okay? We can’t let people know Lance is around.”

“I wonder what would happen if people _did_ know,” Keith confessed. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot. You know, worse case scenario stuff. Do you think they’d turn him into an experiment or something? And it’ll blow up on social media and then the _government_ would shut it all down and it’ll be like he never came back because they destroy all traces of his post-death self and—”

Shiro silenced him with a pat on the head, and ruffled his hair around. “You’re getting ahead of yourself. Let’s not think about that. That worse case scenario has a slim chance of survival.”

Keith grinned a little, and it caused his nose to scrunch up when Shiro went in to mess with his hair again. He tugged out Keith’s ponytail and snatched it out of Keith’s grasp, heading for the pizzeria door Lance, Hunk, and Pidge seemed to miss. “Hey guys! This way!” Shiro called out to them, nodding to the restaurant door. They hurried to catch up, Lance dropping to his feet again, and running to beat Keith to the door. He hooted and hollered like he did any other day, and smiled just like any other day, and _was_ just like any other day despite the fact that the setting sun was starting to bring out the glow of his soft edges, and the glint of that ridiculous smirk.

“Slow poke—you gotta be faster than that,” he chastised Keith before bounding through the doorway after Shiro, and leaving Keith to snatch the door before it could close. It just led Pidge to slip in before him, so he held the door for Hunk.

“Thanks man,” he said, saluting Keith. He rolled his eyes and sauntered in, watching the dim restaurant light start to pull out a hint of blue from Lance’s aura. It was too faint for customers to worry about it, or even notice it, but once they all sat together in the booth, Keith nudged Lance closest to the lamp at the far end of the table, which managed to mask it all. 

Lance seemed to register what it was, and got excited instantly. He could barely contain it until the waitress left, and he took one of the menus. “Hey guys, watch this,” he said, and covered the lamp so the shadows fell over him. 

He held out his arm to them, and with everyone’s attention on it, it was easier to see the faint outline around his arm hairs, his fingers, glowing against his nails. Pidge shouted, ecstatic, and grabbed for his hand. “So cool!” she gawked, pushing at her glasses before looking up at Lance and Keith. “What is it?”

“He’s a nightlight,” Keith explained. 

“Oh good—I’m afraid of the dark, so that’ll help,” Pidge said, and Lance laughed and wiggled his eyebrows at her, saying, “So does that mean I get to cuddle with you?”

Keith jabbed his pointy elbow into Lance’s side, and Pidge flipped him off. From the side Hunk muttered, “Yup, that’s definitely Lance…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I meant to finish this last night, but then my pupper sat on top of me so I couldn't write properly. ANYWAY! This isn't edited at all so my apologies for homophone mistakes (that tends to happen when I type fast) or other errors.
> 
> OK so I don't want this to turn into a Lord of the Rings scenario where it's just walking. WHAT DO YOU GUYS WANT THEM TO DO ?? I have plans for Allura (insert evil smiley face here) and a general map of things, but **who else do you guys want to see** , and what scenario do you guys want it to be in? We've got Rollo, Shay, Coran... Varkon MALL COP, Flerona, Ulaz, Haggar... I sorta have a plan for Sendak... Kolivan is in Kappa Sigma so we can't use him...
> 
> Antagonists that we know in the show don't necessarily have to be antagonists here !! Ahhh !!!


	10. Dark Chocolate

“Dessert, anyone?” Hunk asked, and for a moment Keith thought to himself, _Oh yeah, that sounds good_ , but then he saw Hunk pull out a baggie full of—

Brownies.

“Shit yeah! Hand it over!” Lance shouted, reaching for the baggie and taking out a _full size one_. 

Pidge must have seen the horrified look on Keith’s face, because she instantly gasped and hollered, “Hunk! What the hell?” At this, Hunk hesitated, and realized what they were talking about.

Hunk threw his head back laughing and said, “It’s fine! We made a batch of regular ones and no one bought them. Here, you want one?” He took out one, but Pidge eyed it wearily, so he split it in half and took one for himself. Slowly, she reached her hand out and took the other half, and nibbled on it. Lance ate the whole damn thing in one go, chocolatey goodness and all.

After one bite Pidge made a face and said, “These aren’t regular brownies. Don’t you taste that?” 

“Taste what?” Hunk said, and Keith stared at them all with wide, terrified eyes. He trusted Pidge’s judgement better than both Lance and Hunk combined. And Lance at a whole brownie. 

“He’s immune to it,” Keith whispered from the front seat, sharing a look with Pidge who still had half a brownie in her hand, and refused to eat any more of it. 

Keith reached out for her brownie, so she gave it to him. He broke off a small, fluffy piece and sniffed it before taking a bite of it. It was a small piece, not enough to have a real impact, but with the amount of pot they put in the original batch, this definitely had some residue from it.

“Did you guys bake it in the same pan or something?” he asked Hunk, who shrugged and zipped the baggie closed. 

“I dunno. I was just there for part of it. Kolivan finished everything off,” Hunk explained, stuffing the rest of the brownies into his backpack and saying, “Don’t worry about it though! I’m sure they’re clean.”

“Your tastebuds are nonexistent,” Pidge gawked at him. “I bet it’s the chlorine that’s messing with your senses.” With that, she pegged Lance down, who blinked owlishly at her before sticking his nose into the air with a harrumph. 

A minute later, the driver door swung open and Shiro dropped in, shifting into a comfortable position before leaning out to slam the door shut. When it closed, it was like a vacuum sucked the noise out, and left just the five of them sitting in the car waiting for the ticking time bomb to go off in approximately forty minutes now. The tense anticipation of it led Shiro to look at Keith, brow furrowed, “What the hell happened in here.”

Pidge cursed and said, “It’s like he’s got that radar dads have!”

At this, Shiro twisted around to glare at her, and scope the back of the car before turning to Keith again. He swallowed hard, and all his potential for a poker face completely vanished. There was no point in hiding anything from Shiro’s supposed “dad radar.”

“Absolutely nothing. Nothing happened here,” Keith said, surprised by how flat he was able to say it. But either way no one else seemed capable of arguing with Shiro’s skepticism. Hunk snorted and covered it with a cough, looking pointedly out the window so Shiro couldn’t dissect the scent of weed on his breath. His brother pegged him with another glare, to which Keith added, “Everything’s fine. We were just horsing around.”

“Uh-huh. Well… we need to get some sleep. We move out at six in the morning.”

“Where are we going next?” Pidge asked as Lance went for his itinerary to double check. 

“Well, we were supposed to make it to Rapid City today… is that where we’re going?” he asked, “and then we’ll stop by the Black Hills National Forest—”

“Yes to the national forest,” Keith’s brother said, and added, “but we’re gonna make it to Yellowstone after that.”

There was a moment of silence before Pidge went for Lance’s map and spread it across her lap, flipping it over to the full scale of the United States. “That’s… how many hours? It took us four hours to get from Minneapolis to Aberdeen—” She put her fingers up to that distance, and multiplied it across the states. 

“That’s ten hours,” Hunk gawked, looking up at Shiro in awe. “Are we seriously gonna do that?”

“We’ll try it,” Shiro said, glancing at Keith as he continued, “since we’re behind schedule anyways. And Wyoming isn’t exciting until the Tetons, so we’ll just be getting it over with and spend the entire next day in Yellowstone. Like how Lance and Keith planned it.”

Keith’s eyes met Lance’s from across the SUV, as if thinking, “We _totally_ didn’t plan a ten fucking hour car ride marathon.”

Everyone pretty much agreed to it, though, and figured they could all sleep the way through Wyoming if at all possible. Keith could still taste a bit of pot on his tongue when Shiro reminded them to sleep, but Pidge aggressively put a stop to that. “Wait! Wait, we can’t go to sleep yet,” she said, looking at Hunk and Lance for back up, and then Keith.

“Uh… yeah, we gotta play a game first,” Hunk announced, which led Shiro to raise an eyebrow.

“It’s almost ten at night—”

“ _EXQUISITE CORPSE!_ ” Lance shouted, slamming his hands down on the shoulders of Hunk and Pidge’s seats. “Exquisite corpse. We gotta play it.”

When Shiro wasn’t looking, Keith gave Lance a “What the fuck is that?” look. So Lance elaborated. “It’s where we’ve got one person who picks a category, so everyone’s gotta pick a word from that category and let them know. They create a list, add one fake one to the list, and then everyone’s gotta memorize it and guess who said what word. Hunk and I have played it already so one of us could go first.”

_This sounds like an awful game to play while high_ , Keith mused to himself with a dull look on his face. Hunk and Lance thought long and hard for a moment before Hunk slapped his hand over Lance’s face to shut him up and say, “Okay: name of the game is planets.”

“Planets?” Pidge repeated. “So we just pick one?”

“Yup. I’ll go outside the car. Come out when you have your think and I’ll record it,” Hunk said, and left the car before any of them could object. Lance scrambled out after him, practically kicking Pidge in the face, and collapsed outside the car on his hands before he rolled his hips out, and his legs fell against the open car door. Keith slapped his hands over his face so he wouldn’t have to see it, but Pidge was laughing so hard, so he could completely imagine what it all looked like.

The car door shut, Lance gave his word to Hunk, and then came back in. Pidge left immediately after, gave her word to Hunk, and then entered the vehicle again. “Looks like it’s my turn,” Shiro sighed, and left out the driver’s side. Keith’s planet was Venus.

So Hunk scrambled all the words and came back with the list. “So if you guess it right, then that person’s on your team and ya’ll can conspire and whatever,” he clarified before clearing his throat dramatically and jabbing his thumb onto his phone screen. “Imma read it twice. Mercury, Neptune, Venus, Uranus, Mars.”

The instant he finished the list off twice, Keith blurted out, “Lance, Uranus.”

“Shit,” Lance cursed, scowling at Keith from across the SUV. Keith crawled out of his seat and squeezed into the back seat with Lance, snickering. 

He wriggled up close to Lance’s hip and leaned in to whisper in his ear, “You seriously couldn’t have picked a more obvious one.”

Lance frowned as Keith hummed and thought on his other options. He went over the list again and said, “Shiro, Neptune.”

“Nice try,” his brother sniggered, tossing an arm around his headrest and looking to Pidge. “Your’s is Mars.”

She snapped her fingers, hissing, “Foiled again.” She crawled up into the passenger’s seat, loose patterned pants hiking up against her knee-high socks that she crossed over the armrest. They leaned in together to conspire against Keith and Lance, and as they did that, Lance leaned in to Keith to whisper to him.

“My vote’s on Mercury being Hunk’s choice, so default Shiro’s Neptune,” he murmured quietly, the warmth of his breath touching the shell of Keith’s ear. A slight shiver went down his spine, but he ignored it as best he could, along with the intensity of chlorine in the air. It felt like a sauna in there.

Now was definitely _not_ the time to be turned on by Post-Lance with his _brother_ of all people sitting in the front of the car.

“Keith—Mercury,” Shiro called out, breaking them out of their trance. Keith hadn’t realized that he and Lance were practically leaning their faces together as they studied Shiro and Pidge secretly plot their demise.

“Nope. You had Neptune, though,” Keith announced, and one curse later, he won the game and got to pick the next category.

They played as many rounds as they could think of categories to play with. It was pitch black out, but they didn’t need any lights considering Lance provided it all with his shimmering, exterior glow. It filtered over the ceiling of the car in a water-like web, and was consistently bright until they ended the game. They stopped on a bizarre category having to do with Buzzfeed quizzes, mainly because halfway through Lance got distracted and giggly and started glowing like a goddamn sun ray. 

The blue in the car spiked, and something flashed from directly next to his vision where Lance was nuzzling the side of his face. It spread a glow over the back of Hunk and Pidge’s seats, and Hunk gasped at it and murmured, “Pretty… where’d it come from…?” in his slow… blissed out… drawling voice. He looked back at Keith, who was struggling to sit up straight when Lance was collapsing all his weight into Keith’s side. “Lance—! You’re glowing!”

“I know I’m gorgeous…” Lance said, shoving his cheek against Keith’s shoulder and rubbing it against there. “You… smell like rain—like… clean air—is that…? My jacket?”

“Oh no,” Pidge giggled, tipping her head back against the seat and rolling it back to look at Keith. “It looks like his hair is on fire.” She pointed to it, but Keith couldn’t really see it from his angle. All he could see was the effect he put on the inside of the car.

The light seemed to perfectly illuminate everyone’s faces—clearing out the hard edges and the hollow ones, and focusing on the sharp reflection on the whites of their eyes. Keith’s attention when to Shiro in the front seat, staring at him as Lance rolled forward and twisted onto his back, staring at the ceiling with his head on Keith’s legs, and his eyes wide. 

“It smells like fruit in here…” Lance said, reaching a hand up to graze the back of Pidge’s seat. “Sugary…”

Keith let his hand fall over Lance’s fiery hair. It was almost white from that pure light, and it shimmered between his fingers like glitter. He glanced over at Pidge, and then Hunk, who was staring, dazed and completely out of it. When he met Shiro’s eyes, his brother was scowling at him. “I have a feeling that whatever is going on now has something to do with what happened before I came back here,” Shiro said.

“Hunk may have a bag of pot brownies in his backpack,” Pidge said, pointing to where Hunk was still slouched against the seat, eyes on Lance, murmuring, “Pretty…”

Shiro slapped his hand over his face and dragged it down the side of his face. “Great. This is just… _perfect_. How much did you guys have?”

“I just had a bite, but Lance ate a whole brownie and now he’s a fuckin’— he’s a fuckin disco ball,” she said, throwing her arms down with a sigh. “I’m sleepy…”

“Sleep sounds…” Hunk started, eyes half-lidded and slowly closing, “— _good_ …”

Lance was still staring at the ceiling like he could see something there other than the shimmering lights. He pointed to them, so Keith looked up at the ceiling and wondered why the interior of vehicles were lined with weak carpeting. After a moment of staring at it, and the fact that Lance’s hand was in front of his face, Keith snapped back into focus by the sound of Hunk beginning to snore. Pidge reached over her armrest and cranked Hunk’s chair back so it practically hit Lance’s feet. He stopped snoring.

Shiro sighed from the front and locked the doors. That seemed to be the general rule to _go the fuck to sleep_.

Keith looked back down at Lance, and was a little freaked out by the fact that Lance’s eyes were still wide as day. He could see all the whites in his eyes and the red hinting his whites and starting to glow blue. He opened his mouth to talk, but nothing came out at first, and when it did, it was in a faint whisper. “It… smells—I can taste chocolate…”

“I’m sure you can,” Keith murmured, combing his hands through Lance’s shimmery hair. 

“Dark chocolate.”

“Mhm…”

“But it’s kinda minty—mint… chocolate, maybe?” he asked, turning his chin up to look Keith in the eye. 

After a moment of studying Lance’s faraway expression, Keith asked, “Are you thinking about your mom?” Lance hummed, and Keith took it as a confirmation. “Yeah, then mint toothpaste and dark chocolate,” he agreed, voice soft.

Before Pidge could tip her chair back, Keith asked Lance to move a little and make room for him on the seat. It was a tight squeeze, but Lance tended to lay on top of Keith anyways so it wasn’t a huge issue. Keith propped up the pillow Lance took from the apartment, and leant his head back to stare at the water spots on the ceiling. Pidge’s chair cranked back loudly, and shifted into place not far from where Keith’s face. She nestled her pillow into place, and curled onto her side, facing Hunk and the light playing all across the vehicle.

Keith felt weird. He knew his relationship with Lance was weird to begin with, and the way they left things made him feel all the more awkward acting like this, especially with _Hunk_ around. But Hunk was blissed out, and didn’t seem to worry all that much… except he remembered how Hunk acted during their talk with Lance in Shiro’s living room. Like he was more worried about _Keith’s_ well-being than he ever was before.

And Lance was Hunk’s best friend—Keith figured Hunk would side with Lance on everything, even in the fight that Hunk dropped in on at the end.

_How can Hunk let me be like this with Lance?_ he thought miserably, swallowing hard and feeling the familiar burn in the back of his eyes, tugging at his optical nerves and making it feel like they were tied in a knot around his throat. _Lance hates me Lance hates me Lance hates me_ —

“Sh…” Lance whispered, his hand lazily falling over Keith’s mouth. “I’s okay… i’s o-kay…”

Keith tried so hard to be quiet. It was so fucking hard to calm his breath, like he just spent a minute under water in a game of Marco-Polo, and emerged from the surface trying to remain as silent as humanly possible while his lungs were on fire and his eyes were watering from the chlorine—

It worked, for the most part. His breath was still uneven, but manageable, and he muffled it against Lance’s white hair. He listened to Lance’s gibberish, reciting, “Rain-drops and lake-water; water-faucet and bath-tubs. Rain-drops and lake-water; water-faucet and bath-tubs. Rain-drops and lake-water; water-faucet and bath-tubs.”

Keith sniffled quietly and whispered, “What are you doing?”

“That’s what Keith smells like. Just not… Lake Michigan… Lake Michigan smells—hm… it smells like sewage,” he murmured, ever fascinated by the light his hand was giving off. “Rain-drops and lake-water…” He spoke like an iambic pentameter, his emphasis coming in waves, and dips on the second syllables, but skipping the conjunctions. This was his rhythm, and Keith fell asleep to it, knowing that in the morning he would be annoyed that he let his tears dry on his cheeks, and leave imprints that he would feel for the rest of the day tomorrow.

  


  


“So my mom smells like mint toothpaste and dark chocolate?” Lance asked the next day, perched cross-legged in the passenger’s seat and more or less out of it. It wasn’t a hungover Lance—hungover Lance was pissed and, quiet honestly, depressed. This Lance was calm and relaxing, and more concerned than anything.

“Yeah. Well, the word ‘mom’ smells like mint toothpaste, but since Ramira and ‘mom’ are the same thing to you, I’m guessing it must have merged,” Keith explained. “My mom smelled like toast.”

“Oh. Cool…” he hummed, staring out the front of the car. Even in the morning light, Lance still glowed a little. The afterglow of nirvana. “So it smelled fruity last night…”

“Because you were thinking of Pidge and Hunk.”

“Hm…”

He felt Lance’s fingers over the fabric of the jacket on Keith’s arm. Keith looked over at Lance, who was now looking at him and pointedly holding on to Keith’s arm like he wanted to say, “Let me hold your hand,” but they were in the middle of driving across the country.

Keith smiled at Lance, and he smiled back in a way that scrunched his eyes up, and rounded out his cheeks. “I like being you. It’s so interesting,” he confessed, and Keith laughed, saying, “I wouldn’t really count that as being me…” But really, it just worried him that Lance could _be_ him at times. _How is any of this possible…?_

The road they took was straight and long and cut through country roads. It was the perfect definition of a Midwestern road trip. Not much to look at, in Keith’s opinion. An hour or so into driving, he was starting to take back the division between California road trips and Midwestern ones. _If only farmland wasn’t so boring…_ he thought, leaning forward over the wheel and resting his forearms on top of it.

Lance fell asleep again as the clock rounded on seven in the morning. He let his hand drift onto the center console. Keith glanced at the rear view mirror and tilted it to see Shiro sprawled out on the back seat, one leg tossed over the back of the chair. Pidge and Hunk were out cold as well.

He focused a lot on the other cars for the sake of trying to memorize as many license plates as he could. At one point he yawned at started to freak out about the chances that he could fall asleep at the wheel. Getting up at six in the morning _really_ shouldn’t be an issue. So he started to focus on speed limit signs, billboards, town names. 

Eventually Lance startled awake again due to a bump in the road, which succeeded in rousing Pidge for a split second just to say, “Fuck the road…” and fall back asleep. Lance shifted in his seat, licking his lips, an pushing both hands through his hair. 

“How long was I out?” he asked, and Keith shrugged, murmuring something like an hour. It was almost eight now. Lance sighed and leaned back again, saying, “You’re, like, the coziest fuckin’ mattress I’ve ever laid on. 

“You said that even when we _had_ a mattress to lay on,” Keith muttered, shaking his head with a laugh when Lance leaned over and shoved his shoulder. “Using me for my soft body.”

“You don’t have a soft body! You actually work out. Sometimes.”

“Yeah, uh-huh,” he said unconvincingly, smirking when Lance continued to whine about it. Really, it should have been the other way around, but Keith was pretty sure Lance knew he was messing around. As if Keith would _actually_ seriously consider himself to have a soft body, especially after being an athlete for most of his life. 

There were some repeating signs on the billboards, mostly for McDonald’s, and Lance pointed out one of them, saying, “Wall-Drug? Sounds like a drug store.”

“No, I don’t think so. I’ve seen it a few times already,” Keith murmured, shaking his head. “Looks like a tourist attraction.”

“So like all the Wisconsin Dells signs?” he asked, and Keith shrugged. Truthfully, he hadn’t spent enough time driving around Wisconsin to know all that much about the Dells. “I bet it’s a waterpark.”

“It is not a waterpark.”

“A secret one, maybe? It’s just under cover,” he explained. They drove for a few miles in silence before Lance blurted out, “Adult video store. Time to go.”

“No.”

“I bet they have really good indie movies…” Lance said seriously, but then grinned cheekily, slouching in his seat as he look at Keith. “Remember _Dreamers_?” 

Keith rolled his eyes. As if he could forget _The Dreamers_. Lance com _pletely_ misleading description of it ended with a two hour movie sex-scene fest that Keith would have found disgusting if Lance wasn’t so damn distracting all the time. It was an indie film, in Keith’s opinion, but it was just as much of a porn film in that respects. 

“I can’t believe you got me to watch that,” he groaned, and Lance defended himself by saying, “But wanna-be Leonardo DiCaprio—! And Eva Green—! She’s _gorgeous_.”

Keith laughed, saying, “Yeah, and now she’s in _Miss Peregrine’s—_ ”

“And she’s _still_ gorgeous there, which means she doesn’t have to be naked to be beautiful and that’s really saying somethin’. And she doesn’t have to be young and promiscuous either to make a name for herself.”

“I can respect that.”

“Yeah, but you’re gay, so I mean…”

Keith gawked at him, looking away from the road just to see Lance’s haughty expression. “That doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate women!”

“Repre _sent_ ,” Pidge slurred from the back seat, punching her fist out into the air. She breathed in sharply through her nose as she shifted her position, and popped her chair back into place. She put down her window, saying, “I feel like my nose is numb from smelling chlorine all night.”

The roar of wind spiraled into the car, and woke up Hunk. Shiro was still unconscious in the back with his jacket strewn over his face, leg still propped up over the seat. Keith folded his left leg under his right knee, and focused on the road while Lance started bantering with Pidge about such-and-such involving Eva Green, his absolute _idol_. 

Keith’s eyes dropped to his speedometer, and then the gas level. “Shit, we gotta find a gas station,” he sighed, and started looking for one on the multitude of signs on the side of the road. 

He cruised to the right lane and coasted off the exit ramp. “We can use my debit card,” Hunk said, leaning up to the front. “How much do you think?”

“I dunno—forty, maybe?” Keith said with a shrug. 

In all the commotion of getting off the highway, and the bump into the gas station parking lot, Shiro woke up with a groan and threw his jacket over the seat. “We getting gas?” he asked. Pidge confirmed it, and soon everyone was gathering outside the car to stretch their legs. 

Shiro went over to fill the tank when Pidge stretched her arms up and said, “I call the back seat!”

“Shit,” Shiro groaned, still half-asleep and leaning against the side of the car. He held a hand up to the top of the car, and glanced over his shoulder at Keith when he came around. “You wanna keep driving?”

“I don’t mind it, unless someone else wants to take over,” he said, which led Hunk to holler from the other side, “I could drive!”

“Okay, sounds like Hunk’s driving next,” Shiro said, and a moment later the pump clicked. He set it into the cradle and called out the total cost to Hunk. Just hearing it made Keith cringe a little. It wasn’t like gas was stupidly expensive anymore, but just thinking about a four dollar gallon made him feel awful for having Hunk pay for everything gas related. 

Keith leant against the side of the car and stretched his arms out and up. In the midst of cracking his knuckles over his head, he heard the people parked on the other side of the pump. They were in the middle of some farm land, with the hill to the side rising up to the highway. The sun was turning swelteringly hot, so Keith was thankful they were in the shade of the gas station. It’d be a warm one, and he could tell just based on the mirage over the pavement on the road. 

“—ry, we aren’t headin’ that way,” the woman said.

“That’s fine. Thanks anyways, ma’am.”

Keith glanced over at Shiro and quirked an eyebrow up, just as the woman said, voice incredulous, “What’s a girl like you doing out this far anyway?”

Shiro pushed off the side of the car and stepped around the pump. Keith could hear the girl stammering out an answer, but stopped as soon as his brother said, “Is there a problem over here?”

Keith wandered over and around the trash can at the end of the pump. There was a short girl standing on the other side of the pump tubing, facing the woman who looked more or less a mix of skeptical and guilty for turning down the girl. There were two kids in the woman’s car, their noses pressed to the windows watching them. 

The girl had a head of short, heavy white hair. Her roots were jet black, and shaved close at the nape of her neck so Keith could see her dark skin. She turned to look up at Keith and Shiro, and her already round eyes turned wider, showing the whites of her eyes around her pale irises. Keith’s eyebrows turned up to his hairline.

“Uh…” she started, looking like she talked herself into a situation she wasn’t quite ready for. 

“Do you have anyone to call?” the woman asked, hand on the pump. Keith could tell she was completely ready to pay the bill and run. 

“You trying to get somewhere?” Shiro asked the white haired girl. If Keith had to guess, he’d say she was younger than even Pidge.

Her eyes flickered between Keith and Shiro, and then went behind them to where Lance and Pidge were standing at the back of the SUV, watching them. Keith realized how intimidating they must have looked—two guys butting into a conversation. “Where… are you guys goin’?” she asked, turning her eyes away from Lance and Pidge to face Shiro again, this time folding her arms over her chest.

“Yellowstone, then Oregon,” Shiro said.

The woman’s pump clicked so she put it back and slapped the gas tank closed. She apologized again to the girl before cruising to the driver’s side of the car to grab her purse. They all heard the locks click down on her car doors before she took off to pay for her gas. Keith’s eyes followed her before he suggested they move away from the woman’s car and her children.

As they backed over to the SUV, the girl said, “I’m going to Rapid City. My parents are waiting for me.”

She looked over at where Pidge was, as if thinking, “They must not be too evil if they’re traveling around with another girl.” Keith looked up at Shiro, who looked back at him and shrugged. He looked at Pidge, who was more or less staring at the girl, her glasses slipping down her nose. 

“We could… drop you off there,” Shiro suggested. “We’ve got room for you. If you’d like.”

Keith always thought helping out a hitchhiker would be more exciting than helping an adolescent girl get from Point A to Point B. But the way she beamed at them all when Shiro offered to help made Keith’s chest seize up. He wondered what she was doing all the way out here anyway, looking more or less… in a rough state of things. “That’d be great, thank you! What are your names?” she asked, scanning over them and landing behind them in the instant it took Pidge to lunge forward, hand out to shake the girl’s hand.

“Pidge! You can call me Pidge,” she blurted out, nudging up her glasses and flashing a brilliant, toothy smile. Keith’s snickered a little, seeing her ears go red, and the amused look on the girl’s face.

They all gave their names, and Hunk when he showed up with the bill paid and his jacket slung over his arm. The girls hook his hand before she pointed her thumb to her chest and gave Keith the distinct scent of a lemon’s skin when she said, “My name’s Allura, and it’s awfully kind of you all to help me out.”

“Well, we better get moving. We don’t want to keep your parents waiting,” Shiro said, patting his hand on the side of the SUV before turning to Hunk and saying, “You’re driving, right?”

“Yup—”

“Allura can sit in the back with me. I’m sitting in the back,” Pidge announced, already shoving open the door and motioning for their newest, lemon-scented guest to enter the vehicle. “This way, m’lady.”

Allura threw her head back and laughed, crawling in and saying, “Aren’t you sweet. I’m glad I ran into you guys.”

Shiro watched after her before realizing that Keith was staring at him. Keith threw his arms up as if to say, “What the hell are we doing?” Shiro clapped him on the shoulder and followed Pidge into the car. “Cheer up. This is exciting,” he said to Keith, and dropped down into the opposite bucket seat. Keith took the other with a roll of his eyes. He didn’t exactly sign up for this, now did he?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Who has a problem? I have a problem.](http://gurlskylark.tumblr.com/post/158478118495/keith-and-lance-from-what-summer-is-d)


	11. Tourist Traps

“So what brings you all the way to… Pierre? It’s Pierre, right?” Shiro asked, narrowing his eyes at Keith, who had little to no idea what the pronunciation was. Shiro, out of everyone, should know that Keith never once set foot in South Dakota before. 

The small, frizzy, white-haired girl laughed a little and corrected the pronunciation. And if Keith knew anything about girls and makeup, it was that she had what looked like the leftover residue of mascara, the sort that created raccoon eyes in the morning, and showed up on the pillow. 

Pidge gave him an earful about it now and again.

“I was actually on a little trip on my own,” she confessed, tipping her head to the side. “That started… about a month ago? I think? I don’t know. I just hop around here and there. I spent a lot of time in Montana, and I would say I was doing church stuff, helping build houses and shit, but… I don’t know. I know how to fix cars though. A bit.”

“Shiro was in autos in high school,” Keith said, pointing accusingly at his brother.

Shiro gave him a dirty look while Allura said, “Oh, cool! I worked for a week at a mechanic’s. He let me stay at his house. His wife was nice.”

There was a brief moment of silence where Shiro studied her like he studied all his grad school work, and then started with a confused, “Um…” so Pidge translated. “So… your parents let you go on this… trip?”

At this, Allura tapped her finger to her full, chapped lips and pursed them. “Um… no, not really. But they’re in Rapid City, and I’ve been calling them every now and then. I send postcards before I leave places. And they’re pretty okay with it I guess. I dunno.”

“That’s so co—” Pidge started, and was promptly interrupted by Shiro asking, “How old are you, exactly?”

She dropped her hands to press into the seat between her knees. She was wearing rugged black overall shorts, so Keith could see the scratch marks on her knees and the unshaven hair on her legs. “Sixteen,” she said, and after a split second, made a grab for her backpack and pulled out a wallet. She dislodged her license and held it out to him. “I got my driver’s license in February. I actually totaled my car on the way to Canada—”

“Holy shit,” Hunk murmured from the front seat. Keith could only imagine how wide _his_ eyes were. 

“—and I have a passport from when my family goes to Mexico, so I was set there. And I was in Montana, and these fellas that picked me up started having engine trouble so I helped as much as I could, just enough to get to the mechanic’s, and then I just stayed there for a bit before I hitched a ride with a family on their way to Iowa, and the long and the short of it is… now I’m here,” she explained, and kicked her legs up between Keith and Shiro’s bucket seats, and smiled like she hadn’t just shared the story of a runaway teenager living the offbeat American Dream.

“That’s so cool,” Pidge finished off. “How’d you meet the guys that picked you up?”

“Well—”

Allura was a recent high school dropout due to her family moving, and her never acclimating to her new school. That was about a year ago. She was a senior, and one might ask, “Why give up now when you’re so close?” Well, dear Reader, several AP classes, two jobs, and the death of her twin sister later, she snapped. One trip to the psych ward, several months in therapy, and one too many stern looks from her parents later, she was out of driver’s ed classes.

She knew her parents were uneasy about letting her drive, so she never had her own car. It wasn’t just her easily distracted mind that worried them, but more or less her recklessness. With driving privileges, coming home didn’t seem like much of a priority. They tried to regulate it by not giving her a vehicle—or, more accurately, a vehicle for her self-medication. It wasn’t that she drank, did drugs, or had a knack for self-harm—it was just the side effects of anxiety that gnawed at her. 

So she cleared her mind in other ways that involved copious amounts of spray cans, a penny board—which Keith noted was strapped to her backpack—and music. They lived near a university where she slipped into the music scene easily, which translated into late-night parties that ended with a walk through the town, to the train tracks, where they’d paint underneath the highway and lay on the train tracks and count One star, Two star, Three stars, Go—“Going” was a method of avoiding the freight trains cutting through the inner city. 

They’d stand, backs flat against the concrete bricks underneath the highway, and feel the tug of the air pressure pushing into their lungs and dipping into their stomachs where the world seemed to rumble, and resonate inside of them. She loved the adrenaline of it. She loved standing close to the trains, and painting on city building walls. So she got into skateboarding, where she met people who knew people who knew in Vancouver who would let her hang out for a while. 

“So I planned to hang out in Vancouver for a while. I wanted to get a job there—like, at a coffee shop or something, just until I turned eighteen. I dunno. It probably wouldn’t’ve even worked anyway, but it was worth a shot. I figured I’d regret it if I didn’t go—and I’d _lose my mind_ at home. I can’t stand sitting around and doin’ _nothing_ , you know?” she said, leaning over her knees and clasping her hands together with a shrug. “I mean, I can’t really _do anything_. Like—sure, my sister’s fuckin’ dead. And I never really pictured my life without her, you know? And yeah, yeah, cliche this, cliche that—we were ‘in the same womb together’, and it’s not like I remember that, but… it was hard. It’s still really hard.

“But she’s totally still around, you know,” Allura said, scowling a little when she looked at Shiro and Keith. “Not in a weird ghost way or anything. But we’ve got all these pictures of us together, and I _look_ like her, so I… dyed my hair this shit color. One of the guys at the park knew the hairdresser who helped me out. And it’d make it easier for people not to recognize me, ya know? Like—I’m pretty sure my parents broadcasted that shit everywhere. That’s just the kinda people they are. It drives me nuts. It drives me nuts! They’re insane!”

“They lost their daughter—I’d go pretty—” Pidge stopped, and pinched a finger over her lips before correcting herself. “I mean, were they… insane before your sister died though?”

“Well, yeah. Definitely. It’s all on my mom’s side, ya know,” she explained with a wave of her hand. She tilted her head to the side, scowling at what seemed to be the screw attaching Shiro’s armrest to the chair. “She’s got it all… And… I mean, _I’m_ not crazy or anything! No one’s _really_ crazy these days, I don’t think, because everyone’s got problems. Is anyone really crazy if we’re all crazy to begin with?” 

Keith was sure none of them wanted to say what they were all thinking, and Keith didn’t want to say anything because he feared that somehow it might link back to Lance. Saying it out loud would just make it more concrete—the fact that Lance committed suicide and was here to take all of their judgements. 

Lance was silent in the passenger’s seat, and somehow Keith could tell he was staring out the window avoiding it. 

Realizing that no one was going to add to the conversation, Allura sat back in the chair and murmured, “Well, yeah, I figured. But short story is: I got as far as Great Falls. I was almost mugged on my way out of a Walgreens or some shit, and drove so fast getting out of there that I wrapped my car around a post. It was a fuckin’ miracle that I didn’t have to go to the hospital or anything. Fuckin’ miracle. I got a bruise where the seatbelt bit into my shoulder and that was about it. There was another guy involved in the crash, and that’s who I hitched a ride with.”

“Jesus. That’s pretty lucky,” Pidge murmured.

“Yeah. Thank Jesus,” she agreed with a little huff, glancing out the window before turning back to Pidge and tapping her on the arm. “So tell me about you.”

“I guess we could start with the college basics. Seventeen, freshmen, studying computer engineering at the University of Minnesota,” Pidge said, pursing her lips with a curt nod, before adding, “My family life is boring.”

Allura burst out laughing. It was a wholesome laugh, and broke the tension almost instantly. “Nothin’ wrong with that. Tell me about them though. What’s life like for Pidge…”

“Holt. Pidge Holt,” she added with a smile, and with the way they were talking to each other, and looking only at one another, Keith felt like he was intruding, so he shifted to look out the window instead, and Shiro followed suit. Besides, Keith knew everything about Pidge. He didn’t need to hear this, in addition to seeing and hearing Pidge fluster over Allura’s comments and praises. 

  


  


They cut onto Route 14, and intersected another billboard for Wall-Drug. “What the hell is this drug and why is it on a wall? And why does it have free ice water?” Lance demanded, which led Allura to burst out laughing from the back, arm thrown over the back of the seat. 

“Don’t tell me y’all haven’t been to Wall-Drug before? You can’t pass that up,” she said, looking at Pidge as she added, “I stopped there for shits and giggles. It’s fun! You can’t drive through South Dakota and _not_ go.”

“So much for Mouth Rushmore being the main tourist attraction,” Hunk commented from the driver’s seat, and Lance added, “[W](http://i3.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/527/985/04f.gif)e know nothing, Hunk Garrett.”

“We should go,” Pidge said aggressively, leaning up between the bucket seats and tipping her head against Shiro’s shoulder. “ _Please please please please pleeease_?”

He reached over, tipped her head up and off his shoulder. “We’re behind schedule. And we shouldn’t keep Allura’s parents waiting,” he warned. Pidge slumped back next to Allura, frowning. Keith shared a look with her, and then found Shiro already waiting for him to argue on Pidge’s side. His brother raised his eyebrows, testing whether or not Keith would engage in battle with him. “Allura’s been gone from her family for over a month,” he reminded Keith.

“So… they wouldn’t mind another day,” Allura finished. “I’ve been gone this long. I mean, yeah, they’re expecting me—but they aren’t here to stop us. Besides, how long’ve you guys been in this car?”

“A long time…” Lance moaned from the front seat, which earned him a glare from Shiro. Lance was too busy staring out the window to notice.

When Shiro didn’t say anything, Keith couldn’t help but think, _This is what you get for picking up hitchhikers_. 

“So Wall-Drug then?” Allura said, and leaned over Keith’s seat to check out the front windshield. Her eyes followed the next town sign and said, “Perfect—it’s just after we merge onto 90. Hunk, right?”

“That’s my name, don’t wear it out,” he called from the front, and followed her instructions no more than twenty minutes later when they cruised onto the traffic of I-90. Less than ten minutes later, Allura pointed out the sign for Wall, South Dakota, and they were taking the exit there.

Main Street consisted of one long, treacherous parking lot that could easily be defined as the flytrap that was the horde of tourists rolling in for the season. It became glaringly obvious that Hunk didn’t fare well in busy parking lots, which led Lance’s navigational instincts to kick in, along with his protectiveness. He cranked down the window and leaned out, shouting at families, “Get the piano _off. Your. Back!_ Move it! Come on!” Keith was laughing too hard to care that more than one angry mom and dad flipped them off.

Hunk let out one long, consecutive moan of distress as he pulled into the closest parking spot, and slammed his forehead to the wheel when it was all over. “I am _not_ driving out of here, I hope you realize that,” he said as all the doors opened aside from his.

On his way out, Shiro said, “I’ll drive next. Don’t worry about it, Hunk.”

“Thank God,” he wheezed before crawling out of the driver’s seat, and meeting with Shiro, Pidge, and Allura on that end. 

“So Wall is pretty much a wannabe Radiator Springs from the _Cars_ movie,” Allura explained, sliding her backpack straps up. Her penny board was strapped onto the back with what looked like a multicolored, rubber tie normally used to strap equipment down on trucks. “Like… it even had the whole ‘busy road makes busy town’ deal going on ever since I-90 was built. Isn’t that insane? And prepare yourselves for a huge Woody from _Toy Stories_ vibe because—”

“Sounds like you know a _lot_ about Pixar, huh?” Hunk commented, and she offered a guilty smile and didn’t deny it.

Keith pushed up his sunglasses as he hopped out of the car, and was met with Lance spinning out and kicking the door shut all in the same gesture. Lance leaned towards him, tugging at the jacket. “Aren’t you a bit warm in that?”

“What? You just want to see my soft body, don’t you?” Keith jested, and was amused to find the faintest of blushes coloring Lance’s cheeks. He laughed and shed off the jacket, bundling it up on his car seat before shoving Lance playfully by the chest. “There, you happy?”

“I’ll be happy when the shirt comes off too,” he all but whispered into Keith’s ear, which earned him a hard elbow to the rib.

“ _Guys!_ Come on, or we’ll leave without you!” Pidge shouted from the other side of the car, and Lance giggled into Keith’s hair before stepping back, being sure to brush his lips ever so faintly against Keith’s cheek. He leaned over and locked Keith’s door before kicking it shut. He left ahead of Keith, devilish smirk and all. _That little shit_ …

[K](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzW6aQfrvmo)eith followed after Lance, and joined them as they crossed the gap between the cars, and came to the overhang outside the door. Each of the pillars looked like they were carved out of a tree and decorated with flowers and such, and dinky little kids toys dotted the concrete and succeeded in luring Lance over to them for the low price of fifty cents. Keith grabbed him by the arm and yanked him away from the mechanical horses. 

Allura led the way in, pulling Pidge along with her as she tipped her sunglasses up and surveyed the open entrance, and the hallway ahead of them. Keith pulled his sunglasses down and observed all the storefronts inside the building, and the… _seriously_ western vibe to it all. Lance slung his arm over Keith’s shoulders, and pulled him ahead after Allura and Pidge down the length of the hallway.

The security guard greeted everyone in to the open corridor of store front facades, and the smell of wood chips and mulch. Allura winked at the guard on the way past, and Pidge blushed as they hurried past, glancing back at Keith as he eyed the sideburns on the guard. Talk about overkill. 

Allura’s hair hitched up where her sunglasses combed them back, displaying a zigzagging line of jet black roots on her hairline. Her grayish eyes combed over the stands outside the stores, and she grinned at Pidge like she had every idea in the world, and Pidge was about to experience ever last one of them. She slung her arm onto Pidge’s closest shoulder, and pointed to the nearest trinket shop. “Follow me,” she said, and grabbed Pidge by the hand and towed her towards the store.

Keith saw them leave, but was unfortunately stuck with his brother, Hunk, and Lance, who seemed all to enthralled by a… fuckin’… rack of _jackalopes_. Hunk seemed to have a vast knowledge of these rare, mythical creatures, and Keith would have been impressed if the knowledge didn’t flow both ways. Keith wasn’t sure where he learned everything about jackalopes as a cryptids, but it was a little too late to find out. 

“Okay,” Lance said, hands out and expression set. “We get one, keep it on the dash, and it’ll be our mascot.”

“We aren’t getting a jackalope,” Shiro said, shaking his head. “And I am _not_ keeping that thing on _my_ dash. In case you forgot, this is _my car_ you’re planning on embarrassing.”

“This all depends on what you would name it,” Keith said, and earned a slap in the arm from his brother, as if to say, “What fuckin’ side are you on?”

“Well, obviously we’d have to name it Bean,” Lance said, leaning back on his heels and crossing his arms. “It’s Bean or nothin’.”

“I like that name,” Keith agreed, followed by Hunk saying, “Bean it is.”

“What? No. No, no, no—put that back on the shelf,” Shiro said, unsuccessfully trying to stop Hunk from buying it.

As the race started to the check out counter, jackalope in arms, Pidge and Allura showed up looking more or less pleased with themselves. “What’s goin’ on here?” Allura asked, dropping her arm from around Pidge’s shoulders to lean up against the counter while Hunk slid the jackalope across to the cashier. “Please tell me you aren’t.”

“Oh, we are,” Lance said, grinning devilishly. 

Allura rolled her eyes, and with a glance at Pidge, said, “I can’t believe you’re friends with these guys. You’re too cool for them.”

“You aren’t wrong…” Hunk said. He slipped his card back into his wallet and stuffed it into his back pocket. “What other stores are in here?”

“All kinds of stuff. I think there’s a cool jewelry store on the end,” she said, and at the sound of Lance groaning, added, “There’s cool rocks there, and geodes and stuff.”

“I mean… I guess I like rocks…” Lance confessed, and grabbed Keith by the arm to tow him out to the jewelry. On the way out, Keith grabbed Pidge by the arm and dragged her along with them. Truthfully, it made him nervous to leave her all alone with that lemon-scented girl, and it didn’t exactly help that she was only seventeen and under their supervision. The last thing he wanted was for Mrs. Holt to give them all a flying kick to the face for losing her daughter.

Keith felt giddy all over. It was this constant, buzzing feeling that sometimes stole his breath or made him incapable of moving without feeling like this moment wouldn’t last. It was all a matter of how he never thought he’d be able to do _any of this_ with Lance again. He never expected to hold Lance’s hand again, or smile at him again, or hear him complain about unreasonable store prices before cursing the economy, and the trap that was tourist stores.

Pidge leaned over a glass case of gold pieces before glancing over at where Hunk and Shiro were coming around the corner of the side isle. Hunk had the jackalope tucked under his arm, and a smile on his lips. “I can’t believe you guys. What’d you name it?” she asked, nodding to the cryptid monstrosity.

“It’s name is Bean, and he’s our new mascot,” Lance said, pointedly crossing his arms just as Allura popped up from behind Hunk and Shiro to say, “What makes you think it’s a guy, huh?” 

At this, Lance hesitated, and held a hand to his chin before Keith said, “It has antlers, ergo it’s a guy.”

“‘Ergo’? I can’t believe you just used the word ‘ergo’,” Lance giggled, which earned him a slap and a, “I’m over here trying to help you, and you criticize my vocabulary?”

Hunk and Pidge laughed, and Keith’s brother merely rolled his eyes, arms crossed and hip pressed against the glass case. Hunk was about to say something when Allura tapped him on the arm and held up a swatch of leather between her two fingers. “I found this on the way in here. Yours, I’m guessing?”

“Oh, shit—yeah,” Hunk said, snatching it and clutching at it in horror. “Geez, that woulda been bad. Thanks for keepin’ an eye out.”

“It’s what I do,” she said, nudging him in the side before nodding to the spot of the store where all the severed geodes were. Pidge _ooh_ ed at them, and followed Allura’s lead over to the cases. On the way there, Keith found one of those ridiculous smooth rock kiosks. He dipped his hand into the bin of them, and lifted a few up to show to Lance. 

“Lame. Waste of money, huh?” Lance said, and a moment later Allura popped up between them and lifted up a glistening purple one with a swirl of white across one edge. She looked towards the cashier’s, which was on the other side of the store where they started off. 

“S’not a waste of money if you snatch one. Probably costs five cents anyway,” she said, tossing it in the air and catching it before stuffing it into her jacket pocket. Lance gawked at her, but his astonishment easily faded to amazement when the corners of his lips turned up and he hollered, “I like her!”

She tapped a finger to the five dollar sign on the kiosk and wriggled her eyebrows at Keith, who looked over at where his brother was preoccupied by a series of posters on the Wild West. It was a miracle Shiro’s dad radar didn’t go off just then, considering Lance took one—no, actually _two_ —rocks and stuffed them into his pant pockets before hurrying off after Allura’s lead.

Shiro looked over then, finding Keith frozen at the rock kiosk, and he jumped a little in his skin. “What’s going on?” his brother asked casually, strolling over to him and running his hands through the bin of smooth stones. “Hm, I always thought these things were rip offs. Fake, too.”

Keith laughed hollowly, “Heh, yeah, me too,” before taking off after Lance to get the hell away from the crime center. 

Keith was relieved to get out of the gem store when they did. The last thing he wanted was to get caught by the store manager or something. It was nearing lunch, so Allura took them to the café down a few of the store fronts, saying, “I’ll pay for you guys! To make up for drivin’ me all this way.”

“Aw, that’s sweet—but you don’t have to,” Pidge said. “Besides, I can’t imagine you have much on you.”

“You’d be surprised… I got paid well doing side jobs and such,” she replied with a small wink, and stepped up to the counter with an air of confidence. It was the first time Keith realized she was wearing dusty old combat boots, strapped together with buckles and laces, and a gnarly tear on the soles that lifted with every step. 

The café was rustic and western, and full of all the tourists that they bumped into throughout the stores. There was a line going down the length of the counter, so Pidge and Allura vowed to remember their orders if they managed to save a spot at a table for them. Shiro raised an eyebrow at him, so Keith shrugged, pursing his lips into a thin line, and wondering where in the world she got all the cash that came out of her pockets a moment later. It was all crumbled up and took some straightening out to get into order. 

Hunk, with all his height, was able to spot a booth on the far end of the dining area, and they pulled up an extra chair at the end, which Shiro ended up claiming. Hunk slid into the seat opposite Keith and Lance, and placed Bean at the center of the table. Keith propped his elbow up, and pushed his cheek against it as he reached for the advertisement pinned to a little stand on the table. He twisted it around for a moment before Shiro said, “I don’t know how I feel about this girl.”

“I dunno, she seems pretty nice,” Hunk confessed, and after a moment of hesitation, added, “Well, aside from that weird story she told us.”

“I don’t believe a bit of it,” Lance said, which earned him a look from Hunk that said, “Have some sympathy!” Lance rolled his eyes and slapped his hands onto the table. “Well, I mean, normal people don’t tell their whole life story to complete strangers.”

“I’d be more willing to tell my story to strangers who I’ll never see again,” Keith confessed with a shrug. “We aren’t exactly in a position to judge her since we don’t _know_ her. And Shiro, you’re the one who recommended we give her a ride.”

Shiro sighed as though he was regretting everything. He slouched over the edge of the table, clasping his hands together not far from where Lance was drumming his fingers against the glossy wooden finish. Eventually, Lance shrugged and glanced over his shoulder where they could see the cashier line, where Allura and Pidge were talking and laughing together like they knew each other for years before. “Well… for what it’s worth, I think Pidge is having a good time with her.”

Keith leaned over to glance around Lance, noting how close Pidge was standing to Allura, cheeks pink as ever with an adorable, giddy smile on her face. That was exactly how Keith felt inside with Lance earlier—he wondered if that was how he _looked_ as well. But then they started to talk about the reason for Pidge looking that way, which led Keith to sigh and say, “That’s what I’m worried about.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I listened to _Medicine_ by kngdavd for the entirety of this chapter. Picture them walking in slow mo, wind blowing through Allura and Keith's hair, and the little sparkle on Lance's teeth when he smiles at the security guard. The glint over Pidge's glasses. Shiro combing his hand through his hair, slow motion. Hunk, shooting finger guns at the security guard. The security guard reaches for his chest, taking the hit, falling against the wall as Hunk walks past and blows the smoke off his finger guns. And then Allura, linking arms with Pidge, winks at the camera as she passes and says, "It's called a hustle, sweetheart."
> 
> You don't understand how vivid this image is in my head.
> 
> Also, **Thanks[KitCat](http://archiveofourown.org/users/KitCat74737) for the Wall-Drug idea!** I NEVER WOULD HAVE KNOWN ABOUT THIS. It's like Wisconsin Dells mixed with the wild west and condensed into one block.


	12. A Lesson On Life

Pidge chugged an entire cup of coffee in the time it took for Keith to sip an inch of foam off the top of his mug. The café happened to serve their drinks in mismatched mugs, like they came from a cabinet at home rather than a tourist service—but perhaps that was the tourist service in a nutshell. There were multicolored, glazed saucers and an assortment of utensils to go along with it. They split a huge boat of nachos—literally. It came in a ceramic tug boat-shaped bowl, and mini serving spoons of varying sizes, and varying colors. 

Lance scooped beans and cheese and sour cream over his chip and toasted to Bean on the table. “To our bodiless friend,” he declared before stuffing the entire chip in his mouth all in one go. Keith and Hunk snickered from their end of the table, having to reach over the bodiless rabbit head topped with fake antlers. 

Allura stood up and held her mug into the air, shouting, “For Bean!”

Lance tipped his glass against hers, and by default so did Keith, and Pidge and Hunk and Shiro all at once, yelling—“For Bean!” 

Keith held his mug close to his lips to hide his ridiculous smile—he was sure every last one of his teeth were visible, along with the color on his pale cheeks from when Lance pinched his knee under the table and said, “Oh come on, why are you so dainty with the nachos? I know you can fit more in your mouth than that—”

“You are seriously asking for a black eye right now,” Keith all but seethed, shoulders bunching up to his ears as Lance leaned away, laughing madly to himself and chugging half his latte before slamming the mug down with a shout.

Keith was sure their neighbors on either side of the booth seats absolutely _loathed_ them for all the ruckus they were making. With Allura’s full, booming laughter, and Hunk’s wild stories from the frat, topped with Lance butting in the facts, it was a wonder they weren’t kicked out. Keith couldn’t seem to keep the red off his face from Lance’s comment, and promptly hid it by staying quiet while everyone bantered and scattered across the table, hunting down the last bits of the nachos before Shiro had to pry it away, even when Allura clung to the edge of the tug boat.

“All right! All right—I’m gonna get seconds,” Shiro reassured her, shooing off her hands and shaking his finger at the rest of them. “Damn heathens. Don’t cause too much trouble while I’m gone.”

“Nooo promises!” Lance hollered, throwing an arm up and dramatically over Keith’s shoulders. 

After Shiro left, Allura propped both elbows on the table and leaned forward, jabbing a finger in Keith’s direction. “You and Shiro are related, huh? Resemblance is uncanny, ya know,” she commented, one of her overall straps tipping off one shoulder.

“Yeah, he’s my brother,” Keith said, and promptly slapped Lance’s arm away when he started plucking at Keith’s t-shirt sleeve. “Why do you ask?”

“Oh, no reason. But I’ve been wondering—how long have you two been dating?” she asked, and the question floored Keith. It wasn’t that they hadn’t gotten asked that before—more than once people at Kappa Sigma joked around with Lance about it. _Oh_ , you spend so much _time_ together! You two look like _such_ a couple—

He cringed a little at the question, and seriously shouldn’t have been surprised as he felt when Lance burst out laughing and said, “ _Dating?_ That’s a funny concept. Hey Keith—when’s the last time we went on a date? Would you count the art museum as a date?” 

Keith could see the look on Hunk’s face from the second Allura asked it, to the moment Lance started joking about it. It wasn’t that long ago when asking a question like that just made Keith and Lance laugh _hysterically_. Once, Keith remembered the joke hitching on a dramatic dip on Keith’s part, and a quick kiss just to get a rile out of people. And Lance kicked his foot into the air, arm slung over Keith’s neck, and shouted, “Fuck the homophobes!” The whole frat chanted that for _weeks_.

“Hey, Lance,” Hunk said, visibly wincing and making a cutting motion over his throat.

Lance deflated for a second, dropping his hands onto the table. “What? Is that not a thing anymore?” 

Keith’s entire face felt like it was made of drying clay. He couldn’t move his hand up to smooth out the tense wrinkles on his forehead, or to tug his red cheeks into the shape of a _normal_ smile. _Is that not a thing anymore_ , he thought bitterly. And to think he would _ever_ be able to come back from an argument like _that_ with Lance—

“Yeah, s’not really a thing anymore,” Hunk said.

“Wait—does this have to do with the fight we supposedly had?” Lance asked, and looked at Keith only to find his shoulders bunched up to his ears, staring at the advertisement stand on the table. He stayed quiet, and felt the tension rising over all of them like some sweltering cloud. Hunk—bless his heart—tried his best to keep it down.

“Can we talk about this later? It’s kind of a bummer,” he said, frowning at Lance. “Like—let’s not talk about it.”

“Agreed,” Pidge put in, eyes wide and flickering between Keith and Lance fast. “Let’s talk about Lance’s obviously error in movie tastes.”

Even with the limited time Pidge spent with Lance before, she seemed to know just where his buttons were. Picking a fight was the best way to distract him. Instantly he was up in arms, gasping at her, “What? No! I have _perfect_ taste in movies! You just don’t appreciate the art of cinematography!”

“I appreciate the art of _good_ film making—not whatever trash you make Keith watch,” she said, leaning back with a superior look on her face. “As if _Rocky Balboa_ is an American classic—”

Lance looked so offended, Keith was surprised steam wasn’t erupting from his ears. He half stood up—“ _You take that back!_ The Italian Stallion is the greatest East Coast piece of ass I’ve yet to see—”

“Wow, thanks. Maybe if I was a boxer you’d appreciate my soft body more,” Keith muttered from the side, folding his arms over his chest and pegging Lance with a challenging smirk. 

Lance sputtered out, “O-Okay! Maybe I would like you more if you were a boxer! But that changes nothing. No one can top Rocky and Adrian, and their nonexistent dog that vanishes after the first movie…” At this, Lance collapsed back against the booth and threw his arm up against the wood paneling over their heads. “It’s almost as much of a classic as _Harold and Maude_ is…!”

“I agree with it being a classic, but _seriously?_ ” Hunk said.

“I have no clue what this is,” Allura confessed, so Pidge filled her in with a simple, “It’s about a teenager tryna get with a fifty year old.”

“What are all these white-ass movies…” Allura moaned, feigning to swoon against the booth just as Shiro stepped up with another boat of nachos. He asked what he missed, so she said, “Oh, nothing. They’re just fighting over Lolita-syndrome and violence.”

“Violence is never the answer,” Shiro said calmly, lowering himself into the chair with an equally calm expression on his face, “and we all know never to use euphemisms when it comes to pedophilia.”

Allura pegged him with a droll stare, which earned her a glare from Shiro. She pursed her lips and looked away, eyes wide in what could have been the closest thing to fear Keith’s seen on her yet. After a deep inhale, he leaned back in his chair and said, “So I’m guessing _Harold and Maude_ came up again, huh. Weirdest shit I’ve ever seen.”

“ _Thank_ you!” Pidge hollered. “And don’t get me _started_ on _Stand By Me_.”

Just after Lance ripped her a new one, they finished off the nachos and left the café in favor of finding the clothing souvenir shop. Allura led them to the open staircase that climbed the side of one of the store fronts, and brought them to a partial second floor. Keith stuck to Shiro’s side while Lance ranted and raved at Pidge for not appreciating the American Dream, to which she yelled, “What’s with you and the American Dream?! It doesn’t even exist in _Stand By Me!_ It’s just a bunch of kids hunting down a corpse!”

“Yes, but _on their own_! It’s a classic coming of age story—”

“I seriously can’t talk to you right now if this is going to turn into a fuckin’ English class lesson,” she snapped, holding her hand up, and shoving it in his face when he continued to talk. He shook his head, startled, and simmered angrily throughout the entire shop. Keith was certain he was muttering to himself about the nostalgia of his favorite childhood classic being under appreciated by millennial.

Shiro wandered off to talk nonsense with the cashier, and with all the people milling about in the store, Keith found himself searching for the least populated section of clothes. He heard someone step up from behind him, and he glanced over to find Hunk there, smiling almost guiltily.

“Hey,” Hunk said, swaying up next to Keith and clasping his hands together. Keith eyed him awkwardly and offered a curt, “Hey right back at you.”

Hunk followed Keith around the clothing rack, which was enough to hint that he definitely had something to say. So Keith stopped and looked pointedly at Hunk to get it over with. “I just—I was wondering if… you’re okay? I mean, obviously you aren’t okay in general—”

“Wow, thanks.”

“You know what I mean,” he said, exasperated. “But with _Lance_ and all. We haven’t really _talked_ about it.”

Hunk _was_ right about that, but every attempt just felt… strained and awkward and more or less made Keith feel worse overall. Not necessarily about his argument with Lance, but just… made him feel like shit across the board. There was nothing like the secondhand embarrassment Hunk probably has from walking in on Lance and Keith fighting like a married couple on the cusp of divorce. By the time Hunk walked in, Keith’s voice was hoarse from yelling for so long—it was no wonder sock-sniffing Michael called Hunk in the first place.

Remembering it caused Keith to momentarily forget that the fruity taste resonating in the back of his mind wasn’t _actually_ just a memory of panicking over the sight of Hunk bursting into the room—

“Yeah, but there’s nothing to talk about,” Keith sighed. “It… doesn’t matter. You were right.” But why did his voice choke up saying it?

“No—I just said that because—I dunno. I get really stressed out in those situations and I can’t think straight,” Hunk confessed. “I hate guessing what people want to hear. And maybe you did want to hear that, but—it’s not true. It _does_ matter. I guess I just meant to say that—I don’t know. I don’t think he _really_ meant it, you know? It’s like when you argue yourself into a corner and you can’t stop fighting for the losing side for the sake of _honor_ , or whatever.”

“I seriously doubt that,” Keith confessed, wincing. “But thanks. That… helps, honestly. It probably made things weird and shit afterwards, between us, I mean.”

Hunk shrugged and gave a curt nod, agreeing without explicitly saying. Keith laughed a little, and was about to suggest they _find_ Lance before he started preaching about how pure and wholesome _Stand By Me_ was—

He was interrupted by a sharp “ _Hey—_ How’d you get in there!” from the back of the store where the cash register was. Keith looked towards the man, who Shiro was talking to, and then searched for the culprit. For whatever reason, he wasn’t entirely surprised to find a head of white hair sprinting for the door in a flash of lemon, with Pidge’s curly brunette head following after at the speed of light. He could hear Pidge cursing, “ _Shit—shit shit shit—_ ”

The cashier scrambled out from behind his desk, hollering, “You get back here! Stop them—!”

Allura and Pidge were out the door in a flash, taking the florescent color of her penny board with her, and setting the store alarms off. Keith swore he heard their manic laughter, and wanted to die a little. _Mrs. Holt is gonna kill us…_

“We gotta get out of here,” Shiro hissed, startling Hunk and Keith from behind. He grabbed Keith by the arm and dragged him towards the door, yelling for Lance to get his ass over here. They slipped past the store owner shouting, “ _Varkon!_ We’ve got shoplifters!”

“Run, run, run—!” Shiro hissed, flying down the steps to the first floor, and Keith realized why quickly—they’d go straight for the car. It would be a dead end for Pidge and Allura. 

A shriek sounded from the front of the store, and a second later, Pidge burst out from around the corner, nearly skidding into an advertisement sign on the walkway. She shrieked, looking behind her for the split second it took to dodge the oncoming security guard. “Get back here!” he shouted, face red and round and framed by sideburns and all. 

Keith skidded on his feet, and turned back the way they came. Suddenly Pidge was on them, grabbing Keith and Hunk by the hands and hauling them around and past the stairs. “Follow me!” she shouted, sprinting with the wind coursing through her hair and carrying her like her feet never even touched the ground.

They stormed into the store at the far end of the store fronts, sirens blaring behind them. Pidge looked around the store frantically before pointing for the emergency exit. “There!” she shouted.

“What about Allura?!” Hunk shouted.

“She’s out already! The guard cut me off— _eep!_ ” she screamed, and Lance cursed at the sound of the security guard sliding into the store, whistle blaring. 

Lance jumped out of line and took the nearest clothing rack. He flung it into the isle, sending a few shoppers skittering out of the way. A woman screamed when the security guard—Varkon—tumbled straight over it and clamored after them. Lance flipped him off just before disappearing out the emergency exit after Hunk and Shiro. 

When they got to the car and out of the parking lot—Hunk no longer driving due to the anxiety of it—they drove around in circles in Wall, South Dakota for approximately thirty minutes looking for Allura. She hadn’t been at the car when they got there, and seemed to have just… taken off. Eventually, Shiro drummed his hands on the steering wheel and said, “Well, we need to keep moving. Did she ever answer your text, Pidge?”

“No,” she said, dejected. She had her head tipped against the window, and the sigh she let out seemed to cause her entire body to sag. If Keith was more capable of comforting people, he’d give her a pat on the arm and say, “Allura doesn’t deserve you.”

Keith watched her sulk for a moment before glancing back at Lance, who was slumped against the back seat, slowly lowering down onto his side. It was overcast that day, so it was already pretty dim in the car. A faint glow pricked at the edges of the arm he tossed up and over the seat. It made him look almost… Photoshopped into every scenario. 

“What did she steal anyway?” Hunk asked.

“A signed jersey, I think,” she sighed, and groaned continuously as she tipped her chair back. “I’m gonna sleep,” she murmured, and riffled lazily around in her backpack before stuffing a pair of headphones over her ears. She twisted onto her side, away from Keith and everyone else.

Lance held out a hand to Keith, and twisted his thumb over his palm to move around the two rocks there. “I took two rocks,” he said quietly, and Keith inspected one of them up into the light. “You keep one. I dunno what I’d do with two rocks.”

“Fair enough,” Keith replied, pocketing the orangey, marble-looking rock.

They stared at each other from where Keith rested his chin on the propped-up armrest. There was a summery aroma across the entire car, and it started and ended with the fact that Lance’s scent was strong enough to be picked up by people in general. It sandwiched the sugary sweetness that resonated between Hunk and Pidge. And if he stuck to it, Shiro gave off the smell of a random lakeside car ride. 

  


The first time Lance and Keith _actually_ danced at a party happened to be the first party they went to together. Keith got his name onto the list of the Sigma Pi halloween party, and by default also got his name on the Kappa Sigma list. They had plans of hitting both up, and with the reputation of Sigma Pi’s party habits, Keith wasn’t entirely surprised that Lance decided to wear a slutty costume that involved a king’s crown, a red, fluffy robe, and a winner’s belt over his bare abdomen. 

Lance stood in front of the mirror, legs apart, fists on his hips, and let out a sigh. “I’m not buff enough for this,” he said, and glanced behind him where Keith was tucking in his shirt to his trousers. “Oh, come on—you look so basic. Why’d you have to get the one with sleeves? Honestly, why am I Rocky and you’re the police officer when you _clearly_ have more muscle than me?”

“I’m not extra enough to be Rocky,” Keith admitted, and Lance gave an indifferent shrug, turning back to the mirror while still looking at Keith through it. “Beside, you have a better Brooklyn accent than I do, huh?”

“Yeh got dat righ’,” Lance said, tipping his chin up and giving Keith one of those squinty-eyed smirks. Keith would have just ignored him, but this was Keith pre-Lance. They’d only been roommates for two months, and this would be their first party together. Keith didn’t know how to act around Lance, especially when he was _shirtless_ and fucking around like that. 

So Keith kept his mouth shut, and looked away in hopes that ignoring him would help his blush. They spent enough time together that Lance was starting to know ex _actly_ what buttons to push, and when to push them, so Lance kept at it. _Figures_. “Ey Keith, buddy, my _man_! Get ova he’a,” he said, nodding his chin to the side. 

Reluctantly, Keith stepped up, and Lance’s hands went to the closest sleeve on his shirt. “How much was this shirt?”

Keith scoffed, thinking, _Too much for a college student_. Lance leant over to the bin on his right, next to the mirror. “Alone? Probably ten why—EY!” He shrieked when Lance came at him with the scissors, pinched the fabric on his shoulder, and snipped the sewn hem.

Lance grabbed both sides and ripped it. The collar bit into Keith’s neck, and the sound of fabric tearing thread-by-thread cut through their ears. Lance threw the flap of fabric to the floor, and Keith though, _Well, there goes my sleeve_. “See? Ya look better sleeveless. The guys’ll be all over you—plus girls, because you can’t stop ‘em. You can’t stop anybody.”

“Well, that’s kind of alarming, huh?” Keith muttered to himself, and Lance laughed a little, twisting him around by the shoulders and snipping his other shoulder hem. Keith reached for their bottle of Smirnoff and took a sip of it.

So the sleeves came off. Keith kicked them half-heartedly with his slick black shoes, and scuffed his heels on the striped carpet. He pressed a hand to the fake patch on his chest, along with the fake badge, and the fake gold buttons on his chest. Lance’s fingers tucked between the collar of Keith’s shirt and the tie before he tugged on it and loosened it up. “And… _there_. Perfect—wait, undo this button here. God, all you Carlson nerds are a bunch of stiffs, huh?”

“This is how we’re _supposed_ to dress,” he argued, pinning Lance with a glare that he instantly challenged with one of his own. “But you think it looks good?”

“I think _you_ look good—I don’t know about those pants you’re wearing. You’re the one pullin’ it all together, not me. Now let’s get movin’! We’re officially thirty minutes past the fashionably late time, and we’ve got two parties to get to!” Lance announced, jabbing his hands to the door, as if to guide Keith along.

They left the apartment, and Keith nudged up his sunglasses despite it being night. It was just warm enough for them to survive the walk down Frat Row, and wait for the few minute outside to get their names checked off on the list. They were barely standing there for a minute before some people they knew arrived and struck up a conversation. It was these times of moments where Keith got an onslaught of flavors mingling in his head, and clouding around the sentences their friends were forming on their lips. 

College was a mess of new smells and new people, and it sucked because all college really was at the start, was meeting too many people to remember. Keith could remember scents easily, but not all of them had a name to attach to them. Certain faces smelled like lime jello, others blue cheese or green olives in a whiskey old fashioned, and some of them were just particular faces—perhaps it was the words Keith associated with their facial structure that gave them a particular, shared scent, or maybe it was a common sound of their names. Keith always associated his synesthesia with vocals—words, sounds, et cetera—so Shiro always said it was likely shared letterforms. 

“The reason I say that is because Hayden and Aidan give you the same smell—so is that _must_ be the same with Jaden and Caden… _Brayden_. I mean, our brains never really forget anything. It all just gets misplaced one way or another,” Shiro would say in that authoritative, professor-voice of his.

He never got his synesthesia written off by a doctor or anything of the sort—that just didn’t seem necessary, considering it didn’t affect his ability to function. So it all just consisted of him and Shiro feeling around in the dark for what worked, what didn’t work, and what Keith’s brain was all about.

Keith was dragged onto the dance floor by a girl who smelled like… fresh herbs, specifically lilac—or maybe lemongrass? But Keith wasn’t never much of a gardener, so he lumped her into the general herbs group and let himself be carried away by it. The scent was overpowering, and Keith realized it must have been the pregaming. His senses always went a little hazy when he was tipsy, and for the most part it was extraordinary—it was one of the reasons why he loved the tipsy buzz. 

She took his sunglasses and put them on herself—and how they tipped to the side, over one of her ears and slipping just a tad made him laugh. She giggled, rounded nose scrunching and everything. She had her arms around his neck then, swinging him to the side so his back pressed up against the shoulders of who he _thought_ was a stranger until the static in his brain distinguished a summery scent. He glanced over his shoulder, and recognized that ridiculous gold-painted crown instantly. 

Hands started pressing across his cheeks, his temples, holding plastic to them until his sunglasses fit around his ears—however haphazardly. The girl twisted around, rolling her hips into his until he pressed against Lance’s back and felt the velvet of his red cape on his bare shoulders. The texture of it sent a chill down Keith’s spine—he hated velvet; something about it gave him the impression of cotton balls that just made him cringe. But the fact that he was rubbing against Lance completely overshadowed that. 

He laughed when Lance rolled his shoulders back into Keith’s, and twisted to the side to look at Keith. “Is that an invitation?” Lance laughed, the girl he was with leaning forward to Keith’s ear. 

“You good cop or bad cop?” she asked, voice nothing less than a shout over the music. 

“Bad cop, definitely bad cop,” Lance said, and Keith laughed, rolling his eyes. His partner leaned back against his chest and tipped her head against Keith’s shoulder. She pointed beyond them, towards the DJ, and asked a question Keith couldn’t quite hear, but followed along with anyways. Lance and his dance partner followed after them.

They squeezed through the crowd of sweaty dancers and slick floorboards. Keith was jostled forward, someone’s hip bumping into his and tossing him against Lance’s front. They both laughed, and Lance slung an arm over Keith’s shoulders to steady him towards the speakers that were completely turning his eardrums numb and soundless. In the hum of it, he felt the bass pumping through his chest and down to the pit of his stomach, and then plummeting to his feet when the girl dragged him to the top of the floor speaker. She pointed to the DJ and signed something out with her fingers. 

It took a few tries, but the DJ picked it up and the song faded into— _shit_.

Lance and his partner climbed onto the opposite speaker, just as Avril Lavigne came on and Keith groaned, shifting his stance so his partner could twist around, heavy black hair swinging over one shoulder as they sang back and forth—“ _Hey hey, you you, I DON’T LIKE YOUR GIRLFRIEND—_ ” shouting it at Lance and partner grinding on the other speaker yelling back, “ _No way! No way! I THINK YOU NEED A NEW ONE!_ ”

Keith swayed his hips back and forth as the girl writhed against him, knees bending, shoulders twisting to the beat. He pointed to Lance, singing his lungs out and laughing up a storm when Lance retaliated with his hands running trails down the girl’s thighs before they both synchronously pointed at Keith, fists clenching, twisting back and dragging down with the most dramatic, suggestive hip thrusts on beat. 

They dance against one another on top of the DJ speakers, even when Keith’s partner ripped the buttons open on his shirt and licked up his sweaty chest, and Lance’s parter flashed them from across the dance floor. People were chanting, feet stomping, hands clapping over their heads. Keith’s heart was beating so fast that his head felt light from the fog of lemongrass and swimming pools and Avril-fucking-Lavigne smelling like he was high on rubbing alcohol and the sweaty heat of dancing with a stranger on top of the fucking speakers with Lance licking his teeth seductively singing, “— _She’s like, so whatever—you could do—so much better. I think we should get to-geth-er now—_ ”

Keith staggered off the speakers and fell against the crowd of people around them, the song ending and tearing them down from the speakers in the daze of their aftermath. He just barely recovered from the sensation of everyone’s hands on him, and his bare chest where the girl ripped the buttons open, and then—

Lance was in front of him shoving him by the chest, shouting, “Now _that’s_ an fuckin’ invitation! You were sexy as hell—did you see that? Oh my _God_ someone please tell me you _recorded that shit!_ You did? Shit, send it to me—here, add me—”

Lance hand his hand on Keith’s chest the entire time he swapped numbers with the girl who recorded it. Keith wasn’t even paying attention until Lance dragged him onto the dance floor and mock-bowed to him, saying, “May I have this dance?”

Keith scoffed and flicked him in the forehead. “ _You’re_ the one with the crown, idiot—shouldn’t I be the one bowing?” 

Lance threw his head back, laughing, and said, “So is that a ‘yes’ or what?”

Someone bumped into Keith’s back, so he lurched forward and took that as the opportunity to roll his hips towards Lance and drag him forward by the arm. Lance’s quirky smile didn’t even falter as he slurred under his breath, “I’ll take that as a ‘yes’, huh?”

Keith wasn’t sure which one of them ended up playing it dirtier, but either way they didn’t end up making it to Kappa Sigma, which was probably for the better. After that stunt on the speakers, people kept coming up and offering them shots, and regardless of the rule, don’t-take-drinks-from-strangers, both Lance and Keith downed the ones offered like a fuckin’ wedding reception where they linked arms, cheered, and downed the shots. Five later, Keith held the back of his hand to his mouth and coughed into it, shaking his head. Someone pat their hand on his back, and he would have thanked them had Lance not been soaking up all of his attention at one time.

Someone clapped them both on the back, hugging them as she _aw_ ed. “You two’re cute together!”

“Thanks, we’re dating,” Lance said, and Keith went bright red, adding, “We are not!”

“We live together,” Lance said, and Keith was about to deny it, but that would be lying. “Aw, he’s such a good _boy-frand_ —Keith, gimme a kiss, c’mon.”

“We aren’t dating,” Keith corrected again, pointedly raising his eyebrows at the girl, who rose her eyebrows straight back at him. “We _are-not_.”

Lance was making kissy-faces at him. He whined, “C’mon, just one.” The girl started chanting it, so Keith rolled his eyes, and their faces were so close together that it didn’t take much for Keith to turn his head and kiss Lance’s cheek. 

“There, now we should probably go—it’s—what time is it?” Keith asked, arm still around Lance as he leaned towards the girl to see her phone. “Shit—Kappa Sigma’s prob’ly over with, huh?”

“Oh darn!” Lance said, stomping his feet and accidentally marching on one of Keith’s shoes. Thankfully his shoes were tough enough to withstand it, but it didn’t stop Lance from gasping and dragging a hand down Keith’s cheek, saying, “Oh shit! ‘M sorry! Let me make it up to you—let’s go out for coffee tomorrow, my treat.”

“You have a habit of doing that, don’t you?” Keith mused aloud, and thanked the girl for giving the time. 

He dragged Lance towards the exit and tried his best to avoid all the people they knew so they could just get their shit together and leave. Lance waved dramatically to the guys on door-watch, even as they lumbered down the steps by the front door. “See you later, fellas! Great party!”

When they got to the coffee shop under their apartment, Lance stopped at the window and pressed his nose against it. “Do you think they’re open?”

“No, it’s past two,” Keith said, and squinted at the times. “It’s closed on Sundays, too.”

“Shit,” he whined. “Well, here’s me. Give me a kiss goodnight?”

“Lance, we live in the same apartment.”

“Oh, right,” he hummed, and leaned against the door to prevent Keith from unlocking it. Keith slapped his hands down and gave an exasperated look at Lance, but with how hazy his head felt, he was sure he just looked like he was pouting. “Why do I always gotta be the one to kiss my date goodnight? I wanna be dropped off at home some time.”

“We aren’t dating, Lance.”

“Yeah, but we went to the party together and we left together. That’s practically a date.”

“We went to a _frat party_ ,” Keith laughed, and tapped his finger to Lance’s bare chest. He was getting goosebumps, and Keith could see them. Lance was pouting at him, and they were eye-to-eye when Keith finally rolled his eyes, grinning nonetheless. “Fine, I’ll kiss you goodnight,” he said, and Lance’s eyes lit up instantly.

He was about to lean forward, but Lance stopped him quickly, blabbering about how they had to at least pretend Keith was dropping him off at the stoop of his house. “It’ll be like in the movies—and then we gotta be quiet ‘cause my curfew is something ridiculous—let’s say nine o’ clock, so my mom’s probably sitting up waiting for me,” he explained.

“Okay, let me just moan loud enough for her to hear,” Keith laughed out loud, and Lance shushed him, giggling like an idiot. 

They definitely weren’t quiet enough after the initial kiss, because it went on for a few minutes before Lance started fumbling around with the door lock, and then they were tripping up the stairs—only to forget locking the front door, so Keith had to go back down and lock it otherwise sock-smelling Michael and Alfredo John would hear them if they weren’t already passed out. But then Lance grabbed Keith at the top of the stairs and shoved him against their apartment door and pressed a sloppy, open-mouthed kiss to his lips, thumbs pressing in to the hollow curve of Keith’s hip bones. And they stumbled through the apartment trying to whisper and failing, and falling through their bedroom door so Lance actually tripped over his feet and collapsed onto the carpet, and Keith kicked the door hard enough to send the nonexistent pictures on their walls shaking. 

They both cringed and giggled, and tore off Lance’s robe and winner’s belt, and Keith’s shirt and tie, and by the time his belt came off, Lance collapsed into his bed and was snoring.

Keith came back to himself then when he turned around, only to find Lance unconscious and half-on his bed. He scoffed a little, thinking to himself, _Well, it wasn’t like I expected anything to happen_. Still, it was amusing, and Keith couldn’t help but think that Lance was right about one thing. They talked about sexuality before, since Keith figured it was a requirement to let his guy roommates know exactly which side he batted for. Lance described himself as “straight, but experimenting.” 

So in the morning when Keith woke up in his twin bed at the sound of Lance groaning, he wasn’t surprised to find Lance sitting up with both hands on his head, looking over at Keith. Keith pushed himself up onto his elbows, and stayed there, urging his head to get a grip and stop being overdramatic about gravity and shit. 

Eventually, Lance started to talk and had to clear his voice for a second before reiterating: “So… did we kiss last night? I’m not dreaming that?”

“Yeah, we kissed,” he sighed, squinting at the open window curtains before crawling over and yanking them shut. The sliver of light cut over the foot of Lance’s bed where his shoes were abandoned. 

Lance squinted at the blankets for a second before asking, “And you’re cool with that?”

“Yeah, why?” he asked, voice hoarse and starting to grate. 

“Just wondering. I mean—we don’t—well…” Lance started, reaching a hand up to cover his mouth for a second before saying, “Never mind. I thought I blacked out but it’s all just pretty fuzzy. It’s fine.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [So this happened](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10375635/chapters/22917735) on the bus ride back here. I'm only posting the first part for now because I want to finish _What Summer Is_ first. We're probs a little over halfway done with this one anyways, and I just blew up a little when I figured out the plot line for _Find The Others_. It's inspired by Solkorra's Logan AU--so expect gore. Lots of gore.


	13. Class On Synergy

The car shook from the air resistance, which prompted Keith to think, _Oh, we must be stopping_. A moment later they pulled to a stop at the bottom of the ramp, so Keith pushed a hand up the side of his face with a groan. “What are we doing?” he asked.

At the sound of his voice, Pidge shifted in her seat and twisted into a regular seated position. She pulled the lever on her seat and it snapped up straight. “We’re stopping for gas,” Shiro said just before the light turned green. They rolled into the nearest gas station, and Keith squinted at the sunlight breaking through the clouds. He twisted around to see if Lance was asleep, which he was. 

Hunk was up front, seat back, and book in his hands. After a few seconds of Shiro filling up the gas tank, Hunk reached into his back pocket and produced his wallet. 

“Whatchya reading?” Pidge asked, leaning over to see the book cover. “Could you get anything more boring than… what is this? Truman Capote?”

“He’s an excellent writer,” Hunk said as he flipped through his wallet.

“Yeah, if you’re into nonfiction,” she muttered a moment before Hunk cursed under his breath. Keith sat up straighter, watching Hunk shift in his seat to check his pocket again. “What is it?” Pidge asked.

“Nothing—I must have misplaced my card,” he said. “The VISA my parents gave me—”

“Let me see,” Keith demanded, reaching for the wallet. Hunk gave it to him as he got out of the car and started searching all the crevices in his seat. Keith flipped through every flap of membership cards, of IDs, of coupons in Hunk’s leather wallet. There were wallet-sized photos of family members, one of… Lance in high school? It looked like his senior picture and Keith took it out for a split second before haphazardly putting it back when Hunk cursed again, hands in his hair. 

“Shit, shit, shit—my parents are gonna _kill me_ ,” he moaned aloud. “Where could I have put it?”

“Hey—it’s fine, okay? Check where your student ID is,” Pidge suggested, which just led Hunk to slam his fist against the top of his door. It shook the car slightly, which led Lance to wake up and mutter, “What’s goin’ on? Are we stopping?”

“It wouldn’t— _fucking_ be with my student ID. My student ID is in the bottom of my _suitcase_ ,” Hunk hissed. “ _Shit!_ ”

“When’d you last use it?” Keith asked, “At Wall-Drug?”

“Yeah, to buy Bean,” he said, gesturing furiously at the jackalope head on their dash.

The driver’s door was still open, and Shiro appeared there, leaning against his seat. “Didn’t you drop it? Allura handed it to you when we were in the jewelry store.”

They all fell silent for a minute, and Pidge clamped her mouth shut. Keith stared in horror at Hunk as they all realized the same thing. It took a moment for anyone to talk, and it was Lance. “Pidge—don’t you have her number?”

“Yeah, but I think it’s fake. She didn’t respond before,” she said, and slammed her fist into the back of Hunk’s seat with a curse. Her forehead fell against it, and a groan slipped past her lips. “I need one of those brownies…”

Hunk grudgingly sifted around in his backpack and produced the baggie of them, tossing them to her. It hit her in the shoulder and flopped off the seat. “Thanks…” she groaned, reaching down to pick them up. She tore off a piece and munched on it, making a face. “They still taste awful.”

After a moment of silence, Keith took a crumb from one of the brownies as his brother sighed and said, “Okay. I wasn’t planning on letting Hunk pay for all the gas anyways, so I’ll cover us this time. Keith?”

“Lance and I weren’t planning on you guys coming with, so we have enough for gas too,” he said. 

“Good—so we’re set. We don’t need the VISA—call the card company and cancel it so you can get your money back,” Shiro told Hunk, but Hunk just shook his head, collapsing into the passenger’s seat with his hands on his face.

“No… I mean, she’s only sixteen, right? She probably needs the money. Like, what if she was lying about her parents being in Rapid City? She’s on her own, hitchhiking and stealing shit. Just… let her use it up. I don’t care,” he said. 

Lance tapped Keith on the shoulder and pointed to the baggie, which he promptly pulled away from Lance. “Oh, come on. I tell you it’s fun, and you take away my fun,” Lance whined as Keith held the baggie out to Hunk with a pointed glare at Lance.

“I don’t need you rooting around in my head,” he argued. Lance groaned and flopped over on the bench. He didn’t stop moaning about it, even after Shiro left and came back after paying for gas. 

  


  


Keith left the horticulture lab with Pidge, as always. They wandered out the door and into the bitter cold Minnesota winter. It was so cold that year, that the lavender outside in the garden froze in place, like they were still alive. He remembered them distinctly because Pidge always claimed that she would come straight back here in the fall, and “cut down every last one of them, dry them, and hang them around my room.”

“Gosh, out of context that sounds like you’re harvesting bodies,” he said with a laugh, stuffing his hands in his pockets and regretting it instantly. He hadn’t zipped up his coat all the way yet. He reached up and zipped it so it covered his mouth, and the bottoms of his ears. 

Pidge was still circling her massive scarf around her neck and shoulders, saying, “Yeah, well, that might be the case too. But you wouldn’t know that because you haven’t visited my dorm yet. When you gonna stop by? I already said I own Last Of Us, you Xbox _nerd_.”

“Hey, I have games you don’t,” he argued. “Like the _good_ games. Try getting Halo on your PS4, _nerd_.”

Pidge scoffed out loud, but it was muffed by her scarf as she shouted—again, muffled—“There are _so_ many games on PS4 that aren’t on Xbox! Why else do you think I offered to let you play- You know what? Never mind. You can’t come over to play Last Of Us anymore. I retract my gift.”

“That’s hardly a gift,” Keith muttered, but they both knew that he was _dead wrong_ about that. After a minute of walking in silence down the hill, he sighed, “Fine, I take it back. Please let me play Last Of Us before I die.”

“Some day.”

“Oh _come on—!_ ” 

On the corner of the street farther ahead, Keith could see students crossing the intersection, and he picked out Lance from among them. He waited for Pidge and Keith on the street corner, his hands in his pockets—again, missing his gloves—and his wildly colored, striped scarf twisted around the neck of his furry hood. He smiled at them from over the edge of his scarf, and said, “Took you guys long enough!”

“We literally just witnessed you walking across the street. We got here at the same time,” Pidge said, and waddled up to kick him in the shin. Lance dodged her, laughing, before she elbowed him in the gut and said, “Well, I’ll be off. I’ll see you later, Keith.”

“What about me?” Lance whined.

She jabbed a finger in his direction, hissing, “I swear if you go all ‘Don’t I get a hug?’ on me, I will personally shove my foot up your ass.”

Keith snickered at Lance, who looked bitter about the entire ordeal even after Pidge wandered across the street. He looked at Keith and asked, “I’m not one of those guys, am I?”

“I don’t think so,” he answered, tipping his head to the side as Lance just pouted more over it. He pulled out one of his hands from his pockets and inserted it into Keith’s pocket, where he kept his gloved hand warm and toasty. They walked back to the apartment like this, even when Lance _ooh_ ed at the sight of the coffee shop under it. Every now and then he did that, like the fact that there was a coffee shop there _surprised him_. 

He turned to Keith and said, “Can we get a coffee? I have Pocket Points.”

“Sure,” he replied, and followed Lance into the smell of roasting coffee beans, and old paper. That just seemed to be the vibe of the place, with its condensed seating arrangements, and ginger tea-scented barista named Nyma. He could almost taste it on its tongue, but figured the smell of her was so prominent because it mingled with the usual aroma of a coffee shop.

“Keith! Lance, how you been?” she piped up, chipper as ever and leaning on the counter to meet them face-to-face. Lance mimicked her, sprawling his legs out as he leaned back on the counter, elbows hooked on it.

“I’m better now that I get to talk to you,” he said, grinning as she rolled her eyes. “And also because I’m gonna get a vanilla coffee.”

“Oh yeah?” she laughed.

“Mhm. Do you… think you could help out with that?” he asked, twisting around to pull Keith over. “And whatever he’s having.”

“I can pay for myself,” he said, reaching into his back pocket for his wallet, all while pulling up Pocket Points on his phone. Lance seemed to _live_ for the Pocket Points, and Keith couldn’t blame him. As a starving, broke college student, getting a dollar off of _anything_ was definitely worth it. “I’ll have a chai or something. Surprise me.”

“ _Lame_ ,” Lance moaned, but Nyma perked up, saying, “Yay! Okay, I have the perfect thing. And… a dollar off brings us to—” 

After paying, they wandered around near the art and photography wall since there weren’t any chairs to sit in, and they _did_ happen to live just above the place. No point in getting cozy, but Lance seemed to get cozy enough to stuff his hands into Keith’s pockets again. This time he had to stand directly in front of Keith to hold his hands in both of the pockets, and close enough so he didn’t rip Keith’s jacket straight off of him. He could feel Lance’s cold fingers radiating through his gloves, and how his eczema made them red and dry and spindly as always. 

“The air’s so dry in the winter, hence my scaly fingers,” Lance explained when Keith commented on them. He lifted one up for them both to see before stuffing it back into the pocket.

“They aren’t scaly.”

“Oh, come on. They’re totally lizard tails,” he said, and they both laughed. “But you don’t think they’re scaly?”

“No—who even pays attention to that?” Keith asked, just as Lance’s name was called from the counter. But of course Keith paid attention to that. It was hard not to, especially those nights they huddled together in the cold of their apartment, and Lance’s hands ended up bundled together on Keith’s chest, or on Keith’s hip or arm or in his hair. He didn’t mind the poor circulation that made Lance’s fingers almost colder than the air in their apartment.

They took their drinks upstairs and into their room. The futon was the first place Lance dove for, and all in one motion, he grabbed the corner of the blanket there, and spiraled into it. He became a burrito in a matter of seconds. By the time Keith finished unloading his laptop, shedding his jacket, his shoes, and hitching on sweatpants, Lance was half-asleep on the futon.

Even with Lance’s heavy school schedule, he always seemed to make time for what Keith would call Extravagant Naps. There were times where they’d be studying together, and Lance couldn’t pluck up the motivation to continue on without falling asleep. He’d fall asleep over his notebooks and wake up with wire imprints on his cheek. He’d fall asleep with his head against Keith’s lap, and he didn’t mind much if Lance’s naps didn’t go on for hours, and Keith was too worried about him to bother moving. 

Keith would have let him go on like that on the futon, had he not remembered someone Lance said the week before. “If I fall asleep without getting a little homework done, _do whatever you can to wake me up_. Push me off the bed for all I care. Be aggressive, for God’s sake, I have shit to do.”

But Lance looked so _cute there_ …

“Lance, wake up,” Keith said, but it came out monotonous and Lance merely groaned. “ _Lance_.”

“I don’t wanna…” he moaned, scrunching his eyes shut. _Maybe he’s actually tired_ , Keith thought, but the way Lance ordered him _specifically_ to stop him from sleeping… it was like he knew his hour-long naps were getting out of hand. 

Keith went over and shoved Lance in the head—it was the only part of him that was exposed outside of the blanket burrito. Lance moaned and groaned and tried turing over, but that just prompted Keith to shove him off the futon. “What the fuck!” he cried out.

“No sleeping, come on,” Keith chastised as Lance unraveled himself and sat, sprawled out on the floor. He rubbed his hands over his face, realizing that the fuzz there happened to come from his winter coat. He was still wearing his winter coat. 

Keith got down on the floor in front of him and aggressively unzipped Lance’s jacket. He realized that Lance’s eyes were kind of red—it could have been from lack of sleep, or maybe something Keith didn’t want to think about. “I just wanna sleep. I don’t feel good,” Lance whined.

“Nope, you gotta get some homework done first, and then you can sleep,” Keith said.

Lance was silent for a moment, shimmying his arms out of the sleeves, before flopping his hands back down. “If I get homework done, could you take a nap with me too?” 

His voice sounded chipper as ever at the idea, so Keith laughed and said, “I guess. You’re in charge of study music.”

Lance perked up and crawled out from his nest to turn on the speakers. Keith went over to his bed and started homework, and a moment later Lance collapsed next to him, back against the wall, and laptop on his legs. He combed a hand through his hair before grabbing his notebook and pencil from his backpack, and getting to work. Keith waited until the music turned on, and then started writing and writing and writing—

An hour and a half later, Lance was almost finished with his homework, and Keith finished polishing off his essay. He offered to make food in the meantime, and set to work in their grubby old kitchen that was shared with Michael and John from across the flat. Michael was at the small, circular kitchen table and said, “John has a girl over and they’re ‘studying.’ Hope you don’t mind.”

“Not my problem,” Keith scoffed, and cursed when he dropped more noodles into the water than needed. “Shit—you want some pasta?”

“Why do you make it sound like a _bad_ thing? Of course I want pasta,” he hollered, throwing his arms up.

“Good—then you owe me a dollar because that’s probably all it’ll be worth,” he said. Michael went and searched through his backpack before marching over and stuffing a dollar bill down the collar of Keith’s sweatshirt. “What the fuck—You just shoved money down my shirt!” he cried out, laughing as he tried to shake it out the bottom of the sweatshirt, but it seemed to get lost somewhere in there. It wasn’t like Keith had much to obstruct the exit—flat-chested, flat-stomached, flat everything. It really should have just been an easy travel down.

Michael started howling with laughter, and fell against the counter as Keith shoved his hand up his sweatshirt to try and find the money. Eventually it flopped onto the ground, and he bent down so fast he bonked his temple on the edge of the counter. 

“Shit!” he shouted, and Michael yelled out, “Why is this so funny?!”

Keith recovered a little at the sound of someone’s bedroom door closing, and a moment later Lance shuffled in asking, “What the hell’s going on in here?”

“Michael put money down my shirt,” Keith complained, and cursed when he saw that the noodles were starting to boil over. He grabbed a spoon and started stirring as Michael tried to defend himself by explaining that Keith hit his head on the counter, and that whole extravaganza. Lance laughed a little, stepping over to the stove before reaching across Keith and flicking Michael in the forehead. 

“Ouch!” he cried out, slapping two hands over his temple. 

Lance giggled from beside Keith, saying, “No one gets to treat Keith like a striper.”

“Thanks.”

“—Except for me.”

Keith paused for a moment as Michael scoffed and backed away from them, as if to say, “I have no part in this impending war.” Keith set his jaw tight and looked at Lance, eyebrows rising up to his hairline. Lance just looked smug as hell, and took a spoon out of the drawer to scoop out a noodle from the bowl. He slurped it up despite the heat and said, “El Dante.”

“You fucking idiot, it’s _al dente_. And also, I am not a striper. Does it fucking look like we have a dance pole in our room?” 

“I imagine you practice elsewhere, duh. Somewhere that has a proper pole that wouldn’t fall under your weight,” Lance said, and Michael practically spat his water bottle out on the table. Keith gawked at Lance, who didn’t catch on until after Keith bitterly said, “Well, let me just get a salad since it seems I eat too many carbs, according to you.”

Lance sputtered before saying, voice pitching high, “Whoa, wait—I just meant that striper poles are a permanent thing, ya know? We couldn’t just set one up and expect it to stay fixed to the ceiling! Michael! You know what I’m talking about—”

Michael held his hands up in surrender, completely avoiding the glare from Keith. “I am not a part of this fight, guys. Don’t pull me into this.”

“Maybe _you_ should take a pole dancing class to know what I’m talking about,” Lance said pointedly, and quickly held his hands up when Keith fixed his deadly glare onto him. The action was so fast, he nearly tipped over the pot before Keith had the chance to turn off the heat. “I mean, that shit’s gotta be se _cure_ , ya know?”

“I am _not_ taking a pole dancing class—”

“I think by that you mean you wouldn’t take one _alone_. I’ve always wanted to try it! And anyways— _Stop_ giving me that _look_ , Mike!” Lance shrieked.

“How many fucking times do I gotta tell you not to call me Mike,” Michael complained, and the brief toss of the name threw a cloud of turkey at Keith—as if he wasn’t hungry enough as it was. Though, the stale scent of Michael’s socks muted it. 

“I kinda want turkey now—do we have any in the freezer?” Keith asked in the middle of Lance yelling, “Okay, _Mike_!” 

“I am seriously going to strangle you in the middle of the night.”

“Please do.”

“ _Don’t_ make that sound sexual—oh my _God_ , Lance!” Michael yelled, slamming his head onto his textbook. Lance laughed manically as he went over to the refrigerator and checked their meager supply of anything frozen. 

Lance sifted through it all, and Keith came over and studied their supplies from over Lance’s shoulder. Lance tsked under his breath, saying, “That looks like a… _positive_! Hell _Yes_! We’ve got turkey, my dudes.”

“Let the experimenting be _gin_!” Michael shouted from the table, throwing his arms up before swinging out of his chair, a bounce to his step. “You know what we’re gonna do? We’re gonna cook this up, tear it up, and toss it in with the pasta… add some _parmesan—_ ”

“We don’t have parmesan,” Lance sighed. “But what we _are_ gonna do, is whip up some of this spaghetti sauce, and then I’m gonna sign Keith and I up for pole dancing classes…”

“—Which we are _not_ gonna do, but we _are_ gonna get the spaghetti sauce on the stove—Michael, you do that since Lance is doing shit all for this meal,” Keith said, and when Lance was about to argue against it, he added, “Because knowing you, you’d end up burning the sauce. We will have _none of that_ in our fucking kitchen, you got that?”

So Lance sat miserably on the opposite counter, and watched them ready the meal with all the spices Michael that relevant, and all the awful college-student flare that Keith tended to get with his meals. With how hungry they were, just about anything tasted good. That just ended in mac ’n’ cheese with penne noodles and spaghetti sauce, topped with oregano and some weird pepper Michael’s mom brought a month ago that tasted like garlic, but none of them could be sure. They chopped up onions—because who needed good breath anyways?—and added some leftover sticky rice from the Chinese takeout they had a while ago. 

At the end of it, Michael held his hand out pompously and said, “I’ll take my dollar back now, since I contributed to this meal, too.”

Keith grumbled about it, but handed it back anyways. 

True to Lance’s word, though, he signed them up for pole dancing classes in the middle of the meal-making process. Keith didn’t find out until the weekend when Lance’s phone went off, and he glimpsed at the reminder flashing there with a scowl. “You didn’t seriously—” Keith started, but Lance yelped in excitement and cruised over to his clothing rack.

“I seriously did! C’mon, it says to wear shorts and a tank or no shirt at all, but it’s cold out so bring a jacket,” Lance said, speaking fast and all at once, leaving Keith in the dust wondering what the hell was going on. Keith didn’t come back to reality until it was too late, and he and Lance were already out the door, with Michael in the living room laughing his ass off when Lance said where, exactly, they were going.

Evidently, Lance invited some of his girl friends along, so they met up at the bus stop with Keith looking miserably and hating everything about life. The girls giggled at him and tried to cheer him up by saying he’d get to see all the cute girls at the studio. They all knew he was gay and not entirely looking forward to that.

They had to take a bus to the downtown where they climbed the steps up to the dance studio. The entire way, Lance was having a grand ol’ time chatting with all his girl friends and being the center of attention—as always. When it came time to gather on the glossed, wooden floorboards of the studio surrounded by a dozen or so poles, Keith threw his jacket down, glaring at the smug look on Lance’s face, knowing that he somehow magically got Keith to come this far into the city for a fucking class on pole dancing.

“I am literally going to destroy you,” Keith said.

“It better be in a pole dancing competition, because I’d _so_ be down for that,” he countered, a buoyancy in his steps as he stretched in time with the instructor, shooting Keith snobbish looks with that stupid, uppity air. 

But really, Lance was probably what kept Keith in that dance studio for the entire course of the class period.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This wasn't planned at all, but you better believe this is gonna come in again next chapter, and future chapters *wiggles eyebrows suggestively*
> 
> But Lance at the start of the flashback is reminiscent of a friend of mine who last semester would take depression naps, sometimes for four hours at a time. She basically slept through the entire day and stayed up all night. It was not a good semester. Also, I really want to take a pole dancing class tbh? IDK if that's able to happen before I start writing the next chapter... but...
> 
>  **[New thing!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10375635/chapters/22917735)** Also, [lol](http://i.imgur.com/9RTmjda.png).


	14. Roommate Protocol

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: It gets jumbled. I wrote this chapter and I realized it was all out of order, so it's probably more messed up but who even cares. Just be warned that there's flashbacks and references to the past year tied in with the present day stuff going on.

“Hey Keith, look at that pole,” Lance would say every day after that, whether it be a street sign post, a lamp post, a pillar. “Ya know, it looks kinda… empty. Standing there like that. I feel like it’s missing something, but I don’t know what…”

They were in the middle of butt-fuck nowhere on the edge of nothing special, listening to God knows what from Hunk’s playlist. It sounded like a lovechild between Lorde and Tove Lo, which Keith wouldn’t really put past him. Out in Wyoming, there wasn’t much of anything except long, shallow hills sprinkled with tufts of dry grasses and dry dirt, and dry… _everything_. At least his brother was right about one thing: the east side of Wyoming _was_ pretty boring.

There was a random metal pole somewhere on the side of the road, and Lance’s voice came to his head at the sight of it. He missed that kind of banter, as much as it annoyed him. Lance loved to annoy him. He did it on a daily basis and he must have known Keith enjoyed it because he kept _doing it_ , jesting with him every day without fail. It was something he could count on that didn’t just fizzle away—it cut off without notice the second he couldn’t fucking smell the chlorine—

The chlorine was every now, though, and it led Keith to glance over at where Lance had his nose pressed up against the window glass. Keith tugged Lance’s jacket-sweatshirt-hybrid close around his neck, and hid his nose in it. Pidge was asking Shiro questions about his work from where she sat up front now, and Hunk claimed the back seat so he could nap a little. In the bucket seat, Keith could prop his legs up against one of the armrests.

Pidge looked back at Keith and asked, “Hey, remember that time we went to the museum? What artist was that, the one with the creepy sculptures.”

“Oh, um… movie director— _Pan’s Labyrinth_?” he said, raising an eyebrow. It’d been a few months since they went to the museum, and when they went, wasn’t it with—

“Del Toro,” Lance said. “I remember ‘cause of the creepy-ass Frankenstein sculpture.”

“Oh yeah, you had nightmares from that,” Keith said, and laughed a little. “Probably because we watched Pan’s Labyrinth straight after.”

“You guys watched it without me?” Pidge whined, leaning over the armrest to glare at them. “Traitors. Where’d you find it anyways?”

“Illegally, but that’s besides the point,” Lance said. “That exhibit freaked me out so bad. I never want to go back there again.”

Pidge giggled a little, feeling the same sensation as Keith when they shared a look, and she said, “Deja vu?”

“Definitely,” Keith laughed, looking back at Lance and saying, “You’ve said that before. Do you remember saying that? I think it was after we got out of the exhibit and we went by the David sculpture.” And Keith remembered the rest of the day pretty well— _too_ well, in his opinion. They walked back to the bus together and dropped Pidge off at her dorm before booking it back to their apartment. It was already evening, and with the awful fact that it was late winter, it got dark at four in the afternoon. 

Lance was always picky about certain things—Keith realized quickly that any time they kissed it was at night, or close to night, or sunset. In the morning it was like the clock reset and Lance would slink out of Keith’s bed with a groan and get ready for the day without acknowledging the fact that he had to put his underwear on to do so. That was only a few times. Keith counted those times and remembered them _too_ well, like how when they got back from the museum, all their clothes were off in a hurry.

It was dark by the time they got back from the museum, and after exhausting themselves even more, Keith got changed so that he wouldn’t give Michael or John a heart attack, and went to get them food. He came back with leftovers, and Lance had his laptop open. It was the only light in the room, and it glowed over his face and highlighted the edges of the blanket he used to cover himself up. He had himself tucked in up to his chin, and threw down the blanket the instant Keith came up with a plate of cold pizza. 

“ _Yes_ , food,” he cheered. 

Keith laughed, dropping onto the bed next to him and looking at his computer screen. He had a movie up, and paused five seconds into it. “What are we watching?” he asked.

“ _Pan’s Labyrinth_ ,” he replied, taking a piece of pizza and munching on it softly as he started the film again. “Because now we _gotta_ watch it since we went to the del Toro exhibit.”

“Yeah, but Pidge said she wanted to watch it—”

“And is Pidge here? No. So we’re watching it without her,” he replied. 

  


  


“I can’t believe you said you’d watch it without me,” Pidge complained. “Lance, you evil man!”

“Keith _totally_ threw me under the bus there. I’m pretty sure I didn’t say it like that,” Lance argued, but Keith shrugged. He was just telling the facts, and blatantly ignored anything and everything that would give his brother _and_ Pidge a hernia, like the fact that he and Lance had sex before watching _Pan’s Labyrinth_. He wondered briefly if Lance even remembered that detail, and remained bitterly quiet about it as Pidge and Lance bickered over _Pan’s Labyrinth_. 

“Hey guys,” Shiro interrupted, and caused their fighting to cease. Pidge looked at him, and caught sight of what was beyond the windshield. She gasped and ordered that he pull over.

Keith leaned across to the opening between their bucket seats, and gawked at the sight, glancing over at Lance who was going, “What is it? I don’t see anything!” Keith reached back and nudged Hunk awake as Shiro pulled over onto the shoulder of the country road. 

They all piled out into the grass as a few cars flew by and headed towards the horizon they were looking at—the one with the Grand Teton Mountains. 

They peppered up off the horizon with a bluish hue, still speckled with white from the winter, and streaking up to the sky with sharp, jagged edges. They were far enough away to see the main peaks beyond the foothills, and in the countryside like this, they were standing along heavy, log-fencing keeping the horses away from the road. Hunk and Lance went over to the horses and tried to convince them to come closer. 

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Pidge asked, looking back at Keith. “Why the hell don’t we have a decent camera? Did anyone think to ask that?”

“If only we had _my_ camera,” Lance called out from the fences, hands on his hips. “Hunk, why didn’t you fight my mom on taking the camera too?”

Hunk looked taken aback, and slapped a hand to his own chest, as if offended. “Well, I wasn’t exactly in the position to be making demands, now was it? And that camera was _expensive_ —you really think your mom would have given it away just because it was owned by her _dead son_ , in case you forgot.”

Lance muttered something about how sour Hunk still was about Lance’s death. That just seemed to make Hunk irate at the mention of it. As if Lance expected Hunk to get over his best friend’s death in a day. “You don’t seem to take death seriously,” Hunk said suddenly, frowning when Lance turned back to him, raising an eyebrow. Hunk swallowed hard and said, “Yeah—I mean, I get that you were dealt a shitty deck of cards in terms of… mental illness and stuff, but… dying isn’t just a way out of it, you know?”

“Clearly, because I’m still here,” Lance said, hands slapping down to his sides.

“I know, but I mean… you make it sound like death is superficial! Like it isn’t something that affects everyone!” Hunk yelled out. At this point they were all watching them, even if they didn’t want to. Keith scratched the back of his head awkwardly, and when Lance looked around for some kind of backup, he definitely didn’t find any by Keith. “And I don’t _know_ what happened to make you come back like this, but… it’s completely cheating and you know it!”

Lance clamped his mouth shut, staring wide-eyed at Hunk as his best friend’s shoulders heaved, and he pushed his hands over his face. “I’m sorry,” Hunk said, voice muffled by his hands. “I shouldn’t be talking. You aren’t supposed to be here and I’m happy you _are_ , but… I feel like we’re all cheating. I feel like we shouldn’t get to walk around like we own the world because you’re back from the dead and want to… _fucking_ see your parents in _goddamn_ Oregon.”

Hunk dropped his hands, and his eyes were red and he looked more tired than anything. Keith could feel himself hollowing out because Hunk just scraped out every last thing he was thinking. Like, maybe Allura was meant to be a sign—something to check their hubrises. Yeah, you can have a fantastic road trip and shit, but it doesn’t mask the fact that they were riding around with a dead person, cheating life along the way. They were cheating. 

Lance jabbed a finger at his own chest, trying to say something that didn’t quite make it out for a few seconds. “I—I did _not_ plan for this. This isn’t _my_ fault— _Keith’s_ the one who brought me back. I had no voice in this.”

“It wasn’t like I performed a seance or something,” Keith said, folding his arms over his chest with a scowl on his face. “It was an _accident_.”

“Let’s not talk about this now, okay?” Shiro said, waving his hand for everyone to shut up for a second and listen. “We’ve got another hour or so of driving to get to Yellowstone. Just… hold off ‘till then, all right?”

“No, I wanna talk about this _now_ ,” Lance hissed. “Whatever the fuck happened to bring me back clearly involves Keith and I, and I say it has something to do with this fight we had that you guys have been _conveniently avoiding_.”

“It doesn’t have anything to do with our fight,” Keith sighed, looking away from him. “If anything it was a reason for you to stay gone. I don’t see why you’d come back if you knew about the fight.”

“Maybe this is all because we left off on bad terms!” he shouted at Keith. “Maybe you just need to tell me about it and we can talk it out or whatever! And yeah, I want to see my parents, but _you_ brought me back—it wasn’t _my_ fault!”

“It’s nobody’s fault!” Shiro shouted, abruptly cutting them all off before Keith could yell right back at Lance. “Okay? Now everyone get back in the car. We’re all probably hungry so we’re gonna make some fucking sandwiches and get on the road again.”

“My stomach is kinda growling,” Pidge murmured, hands going over her stomach. 

It was past dinner time, but not quite sunset, so there was a soft, golden hue to the landscape, and the summery green in the fields. Just before they were able to get out the grocery bags Lance and Keith packed, a horse showed up, trotting up to the fence and tossing its head against Pidge’s hair. She yelped and scrambled back, nearly tripping into the ditch. Keith laughed a little until he looked at Lance, and found Lance scowling at him.

  


  


Keith _really_ remembered November. It was after the Sigma Pi halloween party, and Keith realized that that _seriously_ could have been a close call. They’d both been stupidly drunk off of the free shots everyone was giving them, and had Lance not passed out, they would have had so much more regret in the morning than just a quick, sloppy makeup session outside the apartment front door. 

So after every party when they were shit-faced or _whatever_ , Keith had to check himself at the door, even when Lance nearly cried sometime on Thirsty Thursday (the time when the parties _actually_ started, because no one could wait until Friday) at around one in the goddamn morning, “I don’t get it! Why do—” a pause of a hiccup, “—keep _doing this_ to me if we—we aren’t g-gonna—”

Keith was so shocked that when tears started to glisten on the very edge of Lance’s eyes, all he said was, “You’re drunk, Lance.”

Even if Lance never wanted to cry, and somehow he had the strength to stop himself that night, he certainly couldn’t stop himself from shouting, “I haven’t had sex with— _anyone_ since Halloween. And I’m _clean_ —! I’m not a slut or _whatever the—FUCK!_ ” 

Lance kicked the frame of his bed so hard, he ended up falling on his comforter, and Keith laughed because he couldn’t help himself. Keith slapped his hands over his face and tried to stop himself, but that just made Lance complain even louder. 

“Stop laughing at me…!” he whined, sitting up and holding onto his toes. “I’m serious!”

“I-I know,” Keith said, laughing so hard he started to hiccup and regretted everything instantly. “You’re right, I’m sorry. It’s just that—we’re always a _mess_ when we get back. I mean, look at you!”

“I am _not_ a mess,” he argued bitterly, though he was still cradling his foot. “Is it because we’re roommates? A-And we’re, like, legally bound to this place and it’d be awkward and I think about this a lot. Like, if you don’t _like_ me, just _tell_ me, okay?”

Keith sighed and stared at the ceiling, thinking, _God give me strength_. “Oh my God, Lance, you’re being ridiculous. This is why we can’t have serious conversations at one in the morning.”

“Can too,” he said, but Keith was already starting to get ready for bed by shimmying into his pajama shorts and t-shirt, and grabbing his tooth brush and toothpaste. He tugged Lance along with him, knowing that Lance would be resistant to going through his extensive night routine, and regret not doing it in the morning. 

They stood side by side in the bathroom, sharing the mirror and the sink. Lance looked like shit, and Keith almost wondered if Lance wore makeup to cover those bags under his eyes, and washing his face suddenly showed it all again. For whatever reason, seeing Lance all mopey like that managed to make Keith feel like shit. They talked _all the fucking time_ during the day—how come they never managed to bring up topics they tried to tackle when they came back from parties at one or two or three in the morning.

Keith was always the first to head back to the room. He stood in the middle of the room for a solid minute before heading over to Lance’s bed and flopping down on it. He laid on his back and stared at the ceiling until Lance came in and shut the door. He dropped his things off at his mini dresser, and assessed the fact that Keith was on his bed.

“What are you doing?” Lance asked.

“Sleeping.”

“Wrong bed, dumbass,” he muttered. He leant against the edge of the mattress, still looking pouty and exhausted. Eventually he fell down onto the bed, his head falling on Keith’s stomach. Eventually he pulled his legs up, but they still splayed off the end of the bed. Lance’s lips pressed into the fabric over Keith’s stomach, and he didn’t think anything of it until Lance lifted up so he could kiss a line down to the hem of Keith’s pants and—

Keith sat up a little and pushed Lance up. Lance looked like one of those puppies that just looked inherently sad all the time, but it never really processed because Keith figured it had something to do with the fact that Lance probably wasn’t getting all that much sleep. It explained the bags under his eyes, anyway. 

“You _want_ to, though—” Lance started, pushing his hands into Keith’s chest. 

“Yeah, but—Lance, have you ever even _been_ with a guy before?” he asked, raising his eyebrows at Lance. The question came out kind of sharp, and it caused Lance to push his eyebrows together. “I’m not—I’m not trying to _undermine_ you or whatever, but—we gotta _talk_ about it first, all right?”

“Fine. I haven’t, okay?” he said, dropping his hands down. He wasn’t really looking _at_ Keith, and Keith couldn’t blame him. His face felt like it was on fire, just thinking about the implications of it. “Have you?” Lance asked.

“Yeah, sorta,” Keith said, which just made Lance snort. “What?” Keith laughed.

“ _Sorta_? What’s _that_ supposed to mean?” he giggled, sitting up straighter and managing a smile.

Keith shrugged, grinning a little. “I dunno. But it’s not really something we can just jump into, ya know? I’m not exactly prepared or anything. I don’t even have condoms, dude.”

Lance’s cheeks went red, and he muttered, “That’s awkward.”

Keith gawked and laughed louder than he intended. “Are you kidding me? Okay, serious question—since you haven’t been with a guy before, would you take top or bottom?” Lance slapped his hands over his face, groaning, “I regret _everything…_ ” and saying that they could drop the conversation for now. They were both still a bit tipsy, and giggly, so Keith couldn’t stop _laughing_ and saying weird shit like, “Aw! Cute—” and Lance would shout, “I’m not _cute!_ ” 

Keith felt so dizzy with excitement that he could barely go to sleep that night. Two in the morning wasn’t really the time of night to start planning things like _sex_ with your _roommate_ , but he couldn’t stop himself. It wasn’t like there was a protocol for this. Last year, when he was living the “dorm life” with the other freshmen, he spent a lot of time with the guys on his floor, and the girls on the floor below them. It just seemed to be the way that friend groups started, and he still saw them now and again at parties and they always had a great time, but it wasn’t like they’d be “life-long friends” or anything. They introduced him to a lot of things, like college parties and alcohol, and eventually sex. 

High school was never really the time for that. AP classes drowned him back then, so sex wasn’t really a priority, and it still wasn’t, but it… felt nice. He could live with sex every now and again, and it’d been a few months so he was probably rusty. The last time was when he thought it’d be a good idea to take a road trip over the summer to a town where a lot of his friends came from, and he stayed at one of their family’s houses.

He wasn't delusional enough to assume freshmen year would be anything like _The Dreamers_ , and it wasn't. It was relatively stress-free, calm, an experience. He got to experience everything he thought college was about, and now he was out of that phase. 

So “Yeah, sorta” Keith had been with guys before. 

But if Lance hadn’t been with a guy before, he couldn’t really judge Keith for being rusty, right? Keith thought about these things for over an hour after Lance and he climbed into their separate beds. He couldn’t stop thinking about it the next morning, and Lance actually woke up around half an hour after Keith did, and found Keith staring at the ceiling, deep in thought. 

“What are you thinking about?” Lance asked.

“Thinking about where to buy the best lube. I never had to buy it so I wonder how expensive it is.”

Lance was quiet for a straight minute, so Keith glanced over at him. Lance shook his head a little, and turned away, tossing his blankets off of himself as he said, “It’s too early for this.”

“Do they sell it at Target though.”

“How long have you been thinking about this?” he asked, and when Keith didn’t respond, he sighed and got up off the bed to get ready for the day. “Shit—I feel like my head is hollow. Do you need some water?”

After recovering from their mildly present hangovers, they discussed the details that they couldn’t talk about last night because they were too giddy to. Lance had fun ordering everything online, which completely explained why he was so proactive about signing them both up for pole dancing classes. So really, Keith shouldn’t have been so surprised by that the day Lance dragged him to downtown Minneapolis for pole dancing lessons.

  


“Have you ever felt not good enough?” Lance asked. It was a Friday—a casual Friday. No plans. No parties. Just… a day to forget about everything for as long as the calendar said March 24th.

But every word Lance said clung to Keith like some film strip. He heard it, sure, but did that mean it processed? Probably not. He was in between Tumblr and homework and taking sips of warm tea, and listening to Lance apparently.

“If we’re talkin’ about calculus then sure,” Keith muttered. “I don’t even see why I need that shit for my major.”

Lance scoffed from across the room, which drew Keith’s attention up more than any of his words. Lance was sitting on his bed, back against the wall and glasses dipped down on the bridge of his nose. They were rectangular, and reflected their university’s website on them in white and maroon.

“What?” Keith said, lowering his legs so he could see better over his computer screen. 

He laughed a little, shaking his head at Keith and saying, “It’s just that—I dunno. I feel like someone from the _business school_ would have already argued something like that to the board. I mean, finance and stuff makes sense, but when will you even _need_ calc?” 

Keith chuckled, leaning back with his arms now crossed. “So you see my point.”

“Yeah! _Fight_ someone on it! Christ—”

“Contrary to popular belief, Carlson kids _don’t_ fight everyone on everything, all right? Not _all_ of us are stuck up, rich pricks in suits and ties,” Keith complained, nose scrunched up and mimicking the look Lance gave him. 

“That sounds like you’re trying to start a fight with me,” Lance said, and Keith opened his mouth to argue, but realized that would just validate Lance’s point. _Damn, maybe this kid should have applied to Carlson instead_ , Keith thought, his annoyed grimace turning to a smirk. Lance looked smug as all hell, knowing that he won the case fair and square. 

That was what they did. They were just… roommates, with nothing particularly crazy in common. Lance wasn’t in the business school—biological sciences, if Keith remembered correctly. The kid suffered through O-Chem last year and was losing sleep over Organic Chemistry 2 this year. At least, that’s just what Keith heard from the war stories Lance and Hunk overplayed at the dinner table. Sleepless weeks, bone-crushing exams, and the ultimate victory that sort of said it was all worth it because of a curve leading to the entire class settling around a solid C+ average. 

College of Biological Sciences. It sounded like a real _blast_.

Keith always noted that phrase with sarcasm. Just the word “ _biological_ ” gave Keith the taste of wet cardboard. Perhaps that was one of the reasons why he chose Carlson over CBS. 

“But what were you talking about?” Keith asked. “About not feeling good enough?”

“Oh,” Lance perked up, sitting a bit straighter. “I dunno. I mean… everyone’s so competitive in my classes. Sometimes I feel like I just don’t… _care_ as much as the other kids do. Like, it doesn’t feel like this is my _life_ some times, you know? I don’t know.”

“That’s some… existential crisis shit right there,” he commented. “But I get it. I don’t want my entire life to be sitting in a law firm.”

“ _Right_ , right,” Lance added quickly. “But I mean—with everyone being so competitive, don’t you just feel so… sub-par? Like, whenever the teacher posts the average score it’s like…”

“…Am I really that average,” Keith finished, and Lance threw his arms up, as if to display the word, spray paint it in red, stick it onto every goddamn street sign. 

Everything is just… average. 

Lance sighed a little, pursing his lips before clicking his tongue against his teeth and waving the whole conversation off with a simple, “Yeah, well, in a school this big I guess everyone feels like that once in a while.”

Keith studied him for a moment before saying, “Yeah… I guess.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm losing my mind. Did I tell you guys that the first thing I wrote from this fic happened to be their fight? It's been lingering at the very bottom of my document this entire time.


	15. Closed For The Season

That same week Lance asked about the validity of average individuals, he had several midterms clumped together, and the stress of it led him to call his mom one day. Keith was at his desk with his legs propped up on his bed, so he was facing the wall where light from the window reflected orange off the white paint. All their walls were painted white—obnoxiously so. There were layers of it, cracking and caking the surfaces on doorframes and the wooden windowsills. Honestly, Ramira thought it was a waste to cover up such beautiful wood, but it was a regulation in the building.

“Hey mama,” Lance said, the smile in his voice causing Keith to laugh a little. A second later something smacked into the back of his head, and he turned around to see Lance mock-glaring at him.

There was some fast-spoken words on the other end of the line, and Lance laughed a little. “Yeah, I have a lot of homework—No, I just wanted to talk. Yeah, how’s Auntie? Oh, she’s there?” There was a brief moment of excited yelling and shouting from the other end of the phone, and Lance laughed at it, saying to Keith, “Can you hear them? _Ma!_ You’re being so _loud!_ ” 

And then Aunt Amara came on the line, shouting, “Are you getting enough sleep, _pollito_?” Lance went a little red, knowing Keith was now watching him with amusement tugging at the corners of his lips. 

“Ya, Auntie.”

“Oh good! Tell Keith I say hi!” she hollered, voice clipping on the speakers. 

“Hi Aunt Amara,” Keith said, just loud enough for her to catch it. 

“Is he getting enough sleep?” she demanded.

“I think so,” Keith laughed, and mouthed to Lance, “Your aunt is cool!” His face was still red, and he was laughing behind his hand. 

Lance collapsed back on the bed and talked to his mom when she came back onto the phone. Keith went back to work for the following ten minutes before his mom must have asked something about his homework load. Lance answered by explaining what exams he had coming up this week, and rolled over on his stomach as she asked by stress, yelling, “Are you drinking enough water? What about food? Do you want me to drop off some food?”

“Mama, you live in Appleton—I’m not exactly the block next over,” he muttered. “And I’m doing fine. Keith and I are actually doing yoga on the weekends at the Rec Center.”

 _Yeah, yoga_ , Keith thought as he pegged Lance with a glare. Lance just winked at him. 

He faintly heard Ramira say something like, “Oh how fun!” Lance laughed and murmured something in Spanish, sitting facing away from Keith. Keith paused in the process of writing, and picked up with it again after he was no longer the butt of their inside joke with pole dancing. They only ever went nowadays if Lance’s girl friends insisted they come, and Lance never turned them down. 

That night they slept in their own beds, and Keith woke up sometime around three and found Lance on his phone. “What are you doing?” he asked, nudging at the hint of chlorine in the air when he rubbed the back of his hand under his nose, and called Lance to attention. Lance glanced over at him, face illuminated blue and white from the screen.

“Oh, I’m just watching videos,” he confessed. “Go back to sleep.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Keith grumbled, face pressed into the pillow so that with just one eye open, he could see Lance smirking from his bed. He thanked the Lord for decent eyesight. Sometimes he thought about Pidge, and how she could wake up in the middle of the night and not see a thing. “Do you ever think about people who wear glasses? Like, if the middle of the night if someone came in and attacked them, they wouldn’t be able to see them.”

“That’s kinda gruesome.”

“I worry about Pidge. I mean, she lives in the dorm and all and it’s _supposed_ to be safe, but you know what happens in the party dorms and stuff. What if a drunk guy stumbles into her room? What if her roommate’s not around?” Keith asked, smudging his hand over his face and pushing his hair back. It was all over the place—his bun must have fallen out sometime in the night.

Lance shifted to face Keith, and hummed thoughtfully. “Do you think about this a lot or…?”

“Nah, I just had a dream about visiting Pidge’s dorm,” he confessed. “She lives on the other side of the dorm where I lived. And some of my old friends live there still, so they were in the dream.”

“Old friends, huh? Like who?” Lance asked, and Keith pursed his lips and raised an eyebrow. Lance rolled his eyes and said, “Okay, fine. You know I’m jealous of all your gay guy friends from last year. And I haven’t even met all of them yet.”

“Yeah, uh-huh,” Keith laughed. “They’re cool. We should hang out with them some time. I bet there’s a house party going on sometime soon. Or we could go see a band at the underground music houses—that’d be fun. I only went once. I know someone who plays at the Big Gay Yellow Dragon.”

“The _what_?” Lance snorted, and Keith laughed because sometimes he forgot how ridiculous the house names were.

“Yeah, it’s a music house. The basement’s all rigged up with black lights and shit. It’s pretty cool—wanna go?” he asked, and Lance reluctantly agreed to it, still laughing over the house name. He could hear the faint sound of something coming from Lance’s headphones, so he asked what video Lance was looking at. 

He ended up shuffling over and lounging on the top of Lance’s comforter, watching some ridiculous Minecraft video by guys who swore too much, and made Lance giggle despite himself.

  


  


Keith couldn’t stop thinking about the fight.

They spent half an hour in that car with the tension of it over their heads, circle their heads, suffocating Keith more than he cared to admit. He tugged his knees up to his chest and stared out the window ahead of him, avoiding the concerned looks Shiro was giving him every now and again. It felt like his chest was aching all over again, but he could smell the chlorine now. 

Quite honestly, he was afraid that if he told Lance about it, and that was all it took to _poof_ , make him disappear, then he’d take his scent with him. And Keith would just have that rugged jacket to go by, and it didn’t even smell like chlorine. It was whatever cologne Lance normally wore. Keith realized that the chlorine never actually masked it—he just always associated Lance with swimming pools over artificial perfumes. 

They took a road going north, following the Tetons. Pidge practically had her nose pressed against the glass, and Lance was forever moping in the back seat. Hunk kept his eyes on the windows until Keith cleared his throat and leaned over his armrest, saying, “Hey Lance?”

“What.” _Bitter as ever_. The kid knew how to hold a grudge.

It took another second for Keith to say anything, and he started with, “You… know how you always smell like chlorine to me?” Lance shrugged, feigning indifference. His expression was starting to turn smug, though, knowing he was about to get his way. Keith sighed a little, annoyed. “Well, if you aren’t gonna look at me I’m not gonna tell you.”

Lance scoffed and said, “Don’t tell me what to do,” but did so looking Keith directly in the eyes. 

That just made Keith look away for a second before saying, “At the end of the fight, you just… completely vanished off my mental radar. It was like I couldn’t even remember what your name was because it didn’t smell like chlorine anymore, you know?” 

As he explained it, Pidge became interested since his condition was involved. “Wait—so scents are able to change? I remember you talking about Shiro’s scent changing and stuff.”

“Yeah, but they’ve never gone away like that,” he explained. “It was… scary. The entire thing was kinda scary—and maybe it was because I never knew that you… suffered from any mental-related illnesses. So I probably didn’t handle that the best…”

Lance made a little noise in the back of his throat that cut Keith off. He looked at Lance, and found that he looked kind of… worried. “Wait—so did I… blow up at you or something?” Lance asked. “Because it’s been a while since I had an attack like those.”

“Hunk mentioned you used to get them in high school,” Keith said, glancing over at where Hunk was still staring out the window. His eyebrows were tense and pushed together. “But… I mean, it wasn’t _bad_ , really—”

“It was pretty bad,” Hunk corrected, pegging Keith with narrow eyes as if to say, exactly, what state Hunk found Keith in. And when Hunk validated it, that just made Lance’s worry turn to guilty fear. Hunk turned away again and said, “Could you guys talk about it later? It bums me out.”

Keith mutely agreed, and saw Lance glance over at Hunk before he settled back in his chair silently, and resumed quietly brooding in the back seat of the SUV. Keith turned back to the front windshield, feeling pale, and probably looking the part as well up until the point where they crossed paths with the Yellowstone sign, and the toll booth admitting park-goers.

They hid Lance from sight before getting to that point, and bought passes for the four of them. Keith was prepared with his own money, and helped fold together Pidge’s before handing it up to Shiro and Hunk’s bunch. He hated that National Parks were so expensive. But, he figured there were reasons for it. The upkeep was probably tremendous for a place like this.

They crossed paths with a fancy yellow inn, and Pidge continuously asked, “Is that where we’re staying? Is _that_ where we’re staying? _Ooh!_ Look at the cute little cottages!” There were cars parked all along the U-shaped drive, and a band of turkeys were waddling through. Hunk waved to them as they all passed and jumped into the ditch, and out into the forest.

They kept going until they reached the camp grounds, which consisted of rows and rows of RVs, campers, and trucks. They drove down the length of one lot of RVs, and parked on the end into a slot between two campers. Shiro cut the engine and looked back at everyone. “How about we all get cleaned up? Hunk, you have the map—could you find a shower station?”

Keith almost forgot that it’d been over two days now. _Time flies_ , he mused, glancing back at Hunk as he rolled out the park map for campers, and it stretched as far as Pidge’s seat. 

He spotted where they were, and the shower station was just… all the way… over…

“Shit. Well, we should probably walk it anyways because we’ve been sitting around all day, huh?” he commented, and Keith shrugged. 

“Sounds good to me,” he said, and glanced over at Shiro. His brother said the same. 

“Though, the real question… is how many towels we brought? I had my mom pack a beach towel, but other than that…” Pidge commented, and proceeded to crawl into the pack for her towel. Keith realized that Lance was leaning over Hunk’s seat, and managed to reach practically across his shoulder without being detected. Hunk jumped, and laughed when he realized it was just Lance.

“God, you scared me. What is it?” Hunk laughed.

“There’s a restaurant right there. Or are we just making snacks tonight?” Lance asked. 

“I snuck in Shiro’s camping gear, so we could start a fire and cook something up,” Keith suggested.

“You _what_? What all did you _bring_?” Shiro laughed, reaching into one of Keith’s grocery bags and pulling out banana clump after grape bag before reaching the s’more supplies. Keith popped open the cooler lid and took out a bag of hot dogs. 

“I dunno. I just expected Lance and I to cook out more. I didn’t think we’d even be stopping by as many fast food places as we have,” he confessed, and found a bag of brats and hamburgers. 

“Smart,” Hunk commented. “I’m down for a cookout. And also for getting into a change of clothes…”

“Okay. Everybody out!” Shiro announced, and swung open his door before jumping to the ground, stretching his arms high. Keith stretched his arms back and walked a few paces away before coming back, feeling like his legs were dull and in need of a tuning.

Lance took out the big duffle he and Keith brought, and pulled out two towels from it. “We could take turns. Hunk, Pidge, and Shiro can shower first, and then Keith and I,” he suggested, and tossed a towel at Hunk, and then the other at Shiro when he came around the front of the SUV. It was practically dark now, and there wasn’t much light to begin with in these areas, so Lance pulled out the two flashlights they packed. One was heavy-duty, which he handed to Pidge when she appeared, beach towel and shower supplies in one hand. The other, he passed to Keith. 

“Sounds good,” Pidge said, flicking the light on and leading the way to the shower stalls. Shiro gave Keith a pat on the back before heading out after Pidge. 

Hunk hung behind to say, “Are you guys gonna take a walk or something?”

Keith didn’t answer because he knew exactly what Lance was roping him into. Eventually, Lance shrugged and said, “We’re just gonna talk. We won’t be long. Now go, before you lose them.” 

Hunk gave Keith one last look before heading after Shiro and Pidge. Keith took in a deep breath, and let it out in the with Lance saying, “Let’s go this way. Start talkin’.”

  


  


Something happened just before finals that year.

Keith came back from class to the familiar smell of chlorine—it’s like that kid wore chlorine-scented cologne every goddamn day. Something that wasn’t familiar, though, was Lance standing around pacing on the phone. His words fumbled to a halt when the door opened, and Keith hesitated in the doorway. Lance’s eyes were on him—bloodshot and red. 

“I-I’m sorry, hang on,” Lance said quietly as Keith tested the waters and stepped into the room, slowly. He got to his desk when Lance hurried out into the living room and shut the door behind him. Keith heard him exit the apartment straight after, and clamor down the steps.

_O-kay…_

Keith didn’t like jumping to conclusions, so he pushed that all out of his mind in favor of prepping for a speech in one of his classes. He pulled up the manuscript document and barely got a paragraph in when he sighed and slapped his hands down, looking at the door and wondering, _What the hell is going on?_

Sure, Lance got emotional sometimes, but crying never seemed to be on any of Lance’s spectrums. But then again, Keith only knew him for a year coming up later this month. It wasn’t like he was a Lance-expert by any means—but he liked to think he was able to read people pretty well.

So when Lance came in, he wasn’t prepared for anything, least of all a perfectly-normal Lance McClain. 4.0 genius, life of the party, a _goddamn_ golden-skinned ray of sunshine.

“Hey! How was class?” Lance asked, kicking the door shut behind him and spiraling over to his rack of clothes. It jutted out from the wall and blocked Lance from view—pretty much the only place for privacy in their room. Keith leaned over to see if he could tell what Lance was doing, but suddenly Lance popped out again so Keith straightened up and shrugged.

“Uh… I dunno. What was—um…”

“I had this _awful_ discussion in literature class—again. What biology major needs a _historical literature credit_ —and no one talked the _entire_ time. It was just two hours of painful silence. Are any of your classes like that?” he asked, stepping up to his bed—it was close to Keith’s desk, so Keith was sort of twisted-around in his chair to see Lance clearly.

The kid was rifling around under his bed for something as Keith mumbled, “Yeah… I guess…? What was—” Lance yanked something by the handle, and his hardshell suitcase came out from under the plaid comforter on his bed. Keith changed his train of thought _fast_. “Going somewhere?”

“Just home.”

“In the middle of the week? Finals are coming up,” Keith said, frowning at Lance as he propped the suitcase on his bed and unzipped it. 

“It’s just for a night or two! Geez, no need to get your panties in a twist,” Lance laughed. “What are you, my boyfriend? No more questions—I have to pack.”

Keith was quiet for a minute, but he didn’t once turn back to his work. Instead, he watched Lance go back and forth from his clothing rack, and pointedly ignore Keith the entire time. Eventually Lance sighed and said, “Will you stop staring?”

“I’m sorry, I’m just _confused_ ,” he confessed. “I come in here and you’re _crying_ and you leave and come back ten minutes later like _nothing happened_.”

“Because maybe I don’t want to _talk about_ ,” Lance bit out, which instantly caused Keith to snap his teeth shut and grind them together. After a moment of silence, Lance turned back to his suitcase and closed it roughly, zipping it with vigor. “And I actually don’t know when I’ll be back so I’ll text you and stuff but—”

“But you’ll be back for finals, right?” he couldn’t stop himself from saying, leaning against the back of his chair and watching Lance turn slightly towards him, but not completely. 

Lance scoffed, shaking his head and saying, “God, don’t worry about it. That’s for me to deal with, _not_ you.”

“It’s a valid question! Did something happen at home, is that why you’re going back?” he demanded.

“ _No_ —Keith, I don’t want to talk about it. You don’t _need_ to know anything! Stop asking!”

“But I’m your _roommate_ —when you pick up and leave that _kind of_ affects me too,” he said, half-sarcastic, but Lance took it seriously. Keith supposed he did to, on some level.

Lance dropped his suitcase to the ground, looking at the ceiling and saying, “ _Oh_ my _God_ —that doesn’t give you entitlement! Just because we kiss a few times and sleep together doesn’t mean you’re suddenly my boyfriend and you get to know every little _goddamn_ _fucking_ detail about my life! This isn’t about you anyway!”

“That sure sounded like it was about me,” he hissed back, glaring ruthlessly. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t _care_ about you, and when you were crying—”

“ _Stop bringing it up!_ ” Lance screamed. “Stop caring about me—no, _don’t_ get up—don’t come _near_ me I don’t want to talk to you!”

Keith stopped, standing trapped between his fucking desk, and that goddamn chair, and the edge of his bed while Lance stared at him, shoulders hunched as if preparing to run for it if Keith made a move. So he stayed where he was and ran two hands down his face. 

Keith sighed before saying, “Just because you _say a few things_ and fucking _order me_ not to care about you—it doesn’t _work_ like that Lance! I’m your friend, of course I care about you!”

“Fucking _stop it_ , Keith,” he hissed, almost threateningly. The skin around Lance’s eyes was starting to turn dark with redness—that glassiness in his eyes coming back.

“No—and… and what’s with you just getting off the phone and _packing_? When’s your bus or plane or whatever? Are you going straight there or something?” he demanded, and when Lance didn’t say anything, he continued, “So you’re just gonna leave? Did I do something wrong that you don’t even want to wait here until your bus actually comes?” 

Lance heaved in a deep breath, and said, voice shaking, “I hate getting irrationally angry—I can’t—I can’t _think_ with you _yelling at me!_ ” He looked at Keith then, seething. “This isn’t about you!”

As Lance tugged his phone out again and starting texting rapidly on it, Keith demanded, “Then what is it? Why can’t I help you with it?” He hesitated, listening to his fingers tap hard on the screen. “Did someone _die_ or something?”

“ _No_. And I don’t want to bring you into it because—It’s just—It’s not like we’re gonna, fuckin’—I-I don’t even know. It’s not like we’re gonna be _permanent_ or anything and it’s not like we’re gonna live together for the rest o-of our lives so you don’t _need to know_.”

Keith stayed quiet, studying Lance as he pushed the heels of his palms to his eye sockets. He could feel his own chest rattling with each breath. He didn’t even know _what_ he was—irrationally angry, like Lance? It seemed to fit the bill with how heated he felt and how fast his mind was pacing over everything Lance just said. He tried rapidly to pick it apart before saying, surprised by how bitter he sounded, “So I’m guessing Hunk knows then, huh?”

“ _Yes_ —we’ve been friends since we were in diapers, of course he knows,” Lance hissed out. “Don’t make yourself s-sound so special.”

“Then was everything just a lie, then?” Keith snapped, yelling, “That night—! When we wanted to talk about… whatever the _fuck_ this is now—did you lie to me?”

“A-About what!”

“About— _fuck!_ —About never having sex with another guy before!” he all but screamed, and was instantly berated with, “It doesn’t matter! S-So what if I have or haven’t! I-It doesn’t make a _difference_!”

Lance’s breath was erratic and seemed to completely dissolve out of his lungs for a split second. His face was red, and whatever else he wanted to say just evaporated with his crying after he sputtered out, “I don’t want to _talk to you about this!_ ”

From Keith’s side, he could feel the tension through the sharp, almost _pop_ of chlorine there. Lance turned away and paced with his hands over his eyes, but Keith knew that they were watery and his face was blotchy. He couldn’t peg the look on Lance’s face with _anything_ he had seen from Lance before, aside from maybe a goddamn swimming pool nightmare. It was probably fall—there’d be rotten leaves in the water, and whatever animals stumbled into it and couldn’t get out. No one was out there this time of year. 

Keith didn’t say anything because the scent of chlorine was overpowering. It was more than enough to tell Keith that this was beyond him, and that he was backing himself into a corner here. Lance didn’t want to fight about _them_ as a _thing_. 

“I’m sorry for bringing it up,” Keith said quickly, walking towards him and having to step over the suitcase on the floor. “Let me help you—” he started, putting a hand over Lance’s back.

Lance pushed at him, yelling, “ _No!_ Get away from me!”

“I’m trying to _help_ —!” Keith argued, his heart seizing in his chest where Lance shoved him. “Lance—! Stop pushing me away!”

He was ruthless in slapping Keith’s arms away, tearing his hands down—it didn’t even seem like that much of a stretch when Lance ended up striking him across the face. Keith staggered under the impact, eyes wide. Lance pushed Keith so hard he tripped over the suitcase and fell, and screamed— 

“ _YOU DON’T HAVE THE AUTHORITY TO TELL ME WHAT TO DO!_ ” 

It was so loud, everything after it seemed deadly quiet. Keith still had his hand over the burning, tingling spot on his cheek. His eyes were on Lance, who stood there, seething, and panting hard. Lance clutched at his chest, tearing at the fabric as he yelled, “You _aren’t_ my boyfriend—you aren’t _anything_ to me! You’re—You’re just my roommate!”

Something in Keith broke. He felt like a kid again. He felt like any connection to a family he had just snapped. Sure, he always had Shiro, but every family they went to—any family Keith ever _liked_ —just seemed to snip at something in his chest that made it harder for his heart to beat. 

And Lance saying that caused the tension of that chord to break the wall of tears that streaked down his cheeks. 

Something was missing now. 

“Lance—” he started, voice breaking. Even the sound of Lance didn’t seem to ring a bell at this point. The idea that Lance was nothing anymore sent his brain into a panic. 

Wasn’t there something missing? It was like he wasn’t even in the room, yelling, “You’re not my friend, I never _liked_ you to begin with! So _stop_ putting words in my mouth and making it seem like—like—”

The room was hollow, so when they heard a door slam somewhere in the apartment, it echoed. Keith looked over at their bedroom door, and heard a brief knock before a fruity, pineapple voice came in, swinging the door open and saying, “Hey-ho! What’s… up?” 

Hunk hesitated with the door fully open, observing Lance in a complete mess, face blotchy and red, and then Keith on the floor cradling a bruised cheek. Keith glimpsed over at Hunk before averting his eyes, taking in a sharp breath of the calming scent and taste of pineapple. Hunk was always a good neutral zone, but it was interrupted by Lance stepping over to Keith and wrenching his suitcase out from under Keith’s feet. 

Keith couldn’t look up from the floor where his eyes seemed to permanently rest for the next few hours. Why did it seem like Lance didn’t exist? He could _see him_ —Lance was standing right there, seething at him.

Lance jerked out the handle on his suitcase and stormed out of the room. He nudged past Hunk, saying, “I need to talk to you.”

If Keith was in a better mood, and not struck with confusion, he would have yelled something like, “Oh, so _now_ you’re willing to talk?!” 

Hunk was still in the doorway, smelling like a goddamn summer breeze. He couldn’t find his voice for a second before saying, “I-I’m sorry, Keith. I’m sure whatever happened—”

“ _Hunk!_ ” Lance shouted from down the stairs.

Hunk jumped a little and took off down the stairs after Lance, shutting the door behind him. Keith turned away from the door and stared at the spot he remembered Lance being. Nothing in the room reminded him of Lance—not the way he saw it. Sure, Lance still had his bed, the rest of his clothes, his shoes—

But the swimming pool was closed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter Lance explains himself.


	16. Yellowstone

“I’ve come to terms with… most of what you said. So if you were to repeat it, I—I think I could take it,” Keith said, breathing in sharply before coughing weakly into the crook of his elbow. “I mean—you were _right_. We _aren’t_ dating and I was acting like I had—I had a _right_ to know everything that goes on in your life but I _don’t_. So I’m sorry if I act like that.”

It took a split second for Keith to realize that he stopped talking, and Lance never said anything. There was a moment of panic—did what they speculate was true? Now that Keith told Lance everything, did Lance just… disappear? 

Keith looked at him sharply, and released a sigh of relief when he realized Lance was still there, solemn and quiet, and glowing blue around the edges. A split second later, Lance lunged at him, throwing his arms around Keith’s neck.

Lance tucked his face against Keith’s grubby, probably greasy hair, and said, voice shaking, “You shouldn’t have to come to terms with it. I’m such an idiot—”

“What are you talking about? You’re a complete genius.”

Lance laughed hollowly, and tucked his face against Keith’s neck now, so he could feel the heat of Lance’s tears turning cold against his skin. Keith’s arms went around him, and they stood there with the beam of Keith’s flashlight cutting through a line of trees between two camping parking lots. 

“I didn’t mean _any_ of it like that,” he said.

Keith frowned a little, pushing at Lance’s shoulders and separating them so he could see Lance’s face. “But you meant it?” Keith reiterated, and Lance opened his mouth, probably to argue, but Keith continued, “Then why the _fuck_ —? Why are you here? How could you just… play around with my _feelings_ like that? Like you’re actually guilty— _Don’t_ touch me! Don’t! I already told you, I’ve come to terms with it!”

Lance hesitated, clutching his hands to his chest. It reminded Keith of the way he started breathing hard, tearing at the fabric over his chest as he stood over Keith on the floor, tripped by his suitcase. Keith pushed his hands through his hair, and breathed out sharply, but nonetheless shaky. 

“I didn’t mean any of it like that,” Lance repeated. “I _really_ like you, Keith!”

“That is _not_ what you said before,” he hissed back.

“I know! I know it’s not what I said,” he snapped, irritated and looking frantic. His eyes were wide, eyebrows expressive and showing just how much it hurt for him to say it. “But—when I’m like that, thinking one thing and trying to articulate it is _damn_ near impossible. I really, _really_ like you. I love how much fun we have and you don’t give two flying fucks about shit! Like—if I had that level of care-free-ness I wouldn’t have these problems to begin with!”

He hesitated, a little out of breath before he continued, throwing his hands down. “But if I told you about all this shit in my life, and how I’ve never gotten a full five hours of sleep in the past six years of my life, or that I used to _lose_ my _mind_ in high school—you’d treat me completely differently! I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but Hunk treats me like some fine china and yeah, I love it, but I don’t want that from you.”

“But everything you said—”

“I meant it because if we were dating or whatever, I’d feel obligated to tell you about all my problems,” Lance explained. “And everything about _us_ is so cool because we don’t _have_ problems. There’s no such _thing_ as ‘problems’—”

“Yeah, but I’ve told you _everything_ about me,” Keith argued aggressively, which just brought Lance’s hands back up to his chest, twisting over the fabric. “You know about me and Shiro. We never had a decent family in our childhood—I _told you_ I’ve moved around more times than I can count—”

“Yeah, but to be fair, you never told me about your synesthesia, which is a pretty cool thing to leave out,” Lance said, and Keith rolled his eyes. “I just… didn’t want to affect the way you think of me, I guess.”

Keith felt that it was hard to soften his expression when he felt so tense about everything. He couldn’t stop wondering if maybe Lance was lying to him just to patch things up. He couldn’t stop wondering about the possibility that this all meant Lance would disappear and Keith would never see him again. 

He couldn’t stop wondering about what would have happened had Lance just _told him_ about his problems. Would Keith have treated him any difference? 

“I can’t… help but think that maybe if you would have told me, I could have helped,” Keith confessed, looking at where Lance visibly winced. “What?”

Lance shook his head, laughing a little, “I don’t know. I gave up thinking I could solve my problems by getting a girlfriend. That just made it worse. It doesn’t take a boyfriend to snap his fingers and _poof_ , I’m all better. It doesn’t work like that. I wouldn’t _want_ it to work like that anyways.

“I guess… it’s not exactly a group effort, but it helps to be around people who are like you or Hunk. You honestly helped a lot,” he confessed.

“But it wasn’t enough,” Keith said, feeling the tension behind his eyes starting to build again. “You’re still dead, Lance. You’re not here anymore…”

“I know, but… I can’t depend on people too much. Because what would I do without you or Hunk? I don’t want to be clingy because my mental state hinges on other people validating me,” Lance explained. He stepped close enough to push their foreheads together before putting his arms around Keith again. Keith was too strained to do anything aside from accept the hug. 

They stood there for a long time while Keith frowned against Lance’s bony shoulder, and pushed his cheek against Lance’s neck and the fuzz of his brown hair. He could see the pixelated specks of blue glowing on the edges of Lance’s hair. 

“My senior year of high school…” Lance started abruptly, catching Keith off guard. “I actually had a meltdown and almost jumped into Lake Michigan. But not, like, casual, ‘let’s swim!’ kinda stuff. I ended up in a psych ward for the weekend. It was rough.”

Keith didn’t say anything. He tried to picture Lance like that, and that would have been a hard thing to visualize had he not known Lance like he did now. And the fact that he could picture it now made his eyes burn harder. 

“And it wasn’t like I came from a bad family or anything, or had terrible friends. You _know_ my family, and you know Hunk… but… it’s _really_ hard to rationalize past-me nowadays. Wait—I mean, you know what I mean, right? Like, you can’t explain shit younger you did. It’s just impossible,” he rambled. 

“Yeah, that makes sense.”

“Right? So that was… not fun. And I don’t really want to talk about the psych ward ‘cause it really bums me out, but if you wanna hear about it—” he started, but Keith shook his head, tightening his hold around Lance’s waist. 

“It’s fine. You don’t need to tell me about it,” he said. He took in a deep breath, and smelled the summer on Lance’s skin. “I’m just… so happy you’re here right now. I haven’t felt like that… _ever_. I can’t even compare it to every time Shiro and I moved around, or when we left California…” He faded into silence as Lance hummed against him, and it rumbled in his chest. If they weren’t in the middle of Yellowstone National Park, surrounded by the shimmering array of Lance’s luminescent glow, Keith would have mistook him for the _real_ Lance. 

But Keith never really _knew_ the real Lance, did he?

“But I mean,” Lance started, “you left families and stuff, and you came to Minnesota and you always have Shiro—so it’s like… do the families and houses really matter at all?”

“That’s what I’m saying,” he said. “After you and Hunk left after the fight, Shiro picked me up. We talked over everything, and that was before your scent came back, when you died and everyone found out about it. It was like… there was no such thing as chlorine for a few days. You were at home for five days.”

They stood around for a few minutes after that, talking in soft, quiet tones as if everyone in the camp could hear them now. Eventually, Lance clasped his fingers between Keith’s, and suggested they head back to see if the others were back from the showers. It took about ten minutes to get back, and Keith gently brought his hand back to himself, and tucked them in the pockets of his jacket—the one Lance never explicitly gave to him. 

They arrived to a fire, and Pidge shouting, “You guys were gone a while!”

“Thanks, Captain Obvious,” Lance said, sticking his tongue out at her.

He crouched down between Pidge and Hunk to observe the fire, and steal a bit of chocolate from the stash. “So… is everything good now?” Hunk asked, glancing up and over at Keith before turning back to Lance.

“Yeah, everything’s fine,” Keith answered, a soft smile on his lips as he noticed Lance looked back at him, and then at Hunk. “We’re just gonna grab our stuff for the showers.”

“The small shower closest to the door has shit water pressure,” Pidge said.

“The one next to that one practically drilled holes into my back,” Shiro added with a wince, rolling his shoulders back with a hollow laugh. “But I think Hunk’s was fine, right?”

“Perfecto,” he answered, displaying the ‘OK’ sign to them. Lance clapped him on the back before standing up, knees cracking a little. Keith was already rifling through their shit to find the night bag full of face wash, shampoo, and what-have-you. 

Keith was about to zip it open, when Lance yelped and shoved a hand over his face, yanking the case out of his hands. Keith snorted, laughing out, “What the fuck? What is it?”

Lance slapped a finger over his lips, holding the case away and bundling it up in one of the towels he got from Hunk. “ _Sh!_ I’ll show you later! Just trust me.”

Keith sighed, rolling his eyes and snatching the towel Shiro tossed to him. “ _Whatever_. Grab your shit—else I’ll leave you behind.”

Lance hurried to grab his spare clothes and ran after Keith, who was following the trail of light he aimed in front of him. They said farewell to the others, and Lance added, “If we don’t come back in an hour, assume we’re dead!”

“You’re already dead, dumbass!” Pidge shouted, and after a second, they heard faintly, “ _And I don’t meant that as a threat!_ ”

Lance chuckled to himself, smirking at Keith, and he realized that it would be _so_ suspicious to be walking around with Lance in such a semi-public space _in the middle of the night_. Lance was a walking torch, reflecting a water filter up into the trees and on the sides of RVs along the way. It was faint, and would probably just look like a distant car far off on a different road, but it worried Keith nonetheless. 

Keith slipped off his sweatshirt—or rather, Lance’s jacket—and passed it to him. “Put this on with the hood up. You’re like one of those movie premiere lights.”

“Am I really? That’s kinda ridiculous,” Lance laughed, and slid his arms through the sleeves. Keith wore it for so long, he suddenly felt cold without it. His arms felt naked and exposed, and it became darker when Lance tugged the hood up over his head.

It didn’t take long for that to start glowing, too, but by then Keith gave up with being discrete.

The shower hut was relatively large, and constructed of concrete bricks, wood paneling, and support beams on the outside shielding the entrance. Keith momentarily wondered what _Pidge_ was doing in the men’s restroom, but he figured being alone in an empty bathroom in the middle of the woods _in the dark_ would be a scary mix.

“I call _not_ the shower that drills holes in your back,” Keith said, slinging his towel off his shoulder and heading down the row. He heard Lance unzipping the case as the overhead lights buzzed on, calling forth whatever bugs were trapped in here up to the ceiling. 

Lance called his name, so Keith turned around. 

Lance was holding up a familiar tube Keith hid in the top drawer of his desk, stuffed far down in case someone came into their room and started rustling through shit. It came out once in a while, enough for Lance to know exactly where it was.

“I can’t fucking believe you,” Keith said, tipping his head back and breathing in deeply. _God give me strength_. “I don’t really think this place is hygienic enough to—”

“Oh come on,” Lance whined. “I’m already dead. It’ll be fun! Just once.”

“ _You_ may be dead, but _I’m_ not,” he laughed, nudging the stall door open with his hip. Even in the dorms he never dared touch the walls of the shower stalls. If his hand so much as brushed it, he’d just spend another five minutes in the shower scrubbing down his hand with soap.

It didn’t stop Lance from shimmying over and invading the shower stall. It seemed like the stalls got progressively larger as you went down the row, but that didn’t mean it was _huge_ or anything. Their chests were pressed together, and Keith’s entire face went red when he realized the tube of lube was wedge between their faces, Lance’s smug, annoying grin the center of it. 

“C’mon—you remember better than I do when’s the last time we did this,” Lance said, and in his goofy, giddy attitude, went so far as to peck his lips on the tip of Keith’s nose. “I know you _waaant to…_ ”

“You’re rooting around in my head then,” Keith muttered, pushing a hand to his disheveled hair, eyes flickering down to that smug grin and back up again. Lance did this thing he used to do, mostly in the beginning of the year, when he somehow magically managed to wriggle his eyebrows in such a way to make them look like a wave. He always said it took him _months_ of procrastinating in class to get it right.

“You’re right—you _are_ an idiot,” Keith laughed, and tipped forward to link their lips together, and kiss the living hell out of Lance—as if that would somehow save him from life or death or Heaven or Hell.

Keith was never particularly religious. His families never really instilled those morals in Shiro and him. He didn’t stop to think about where Lance might have gone—he just never expected to see Lance again _ever_. 

  


  


When they got back to the SUV, the hotdogs were done, and Pidge shouted, “Wow! You guys took long enough!” It was sarcastic, too, which prompted both Keith and Lance to glare at her. She eyed them with her eyebrows up, and held out a plate to them. 

Keith took one of the hot dogs and devoured it, and pointedly ignored the fact that Lance was glowing brighter than usual, even through the sweatershirt-jacket-combo Keith tried to cover him up with. Lance sat beside Hunk on the ground and said, chipper as ever, “Hey guys! What’s up? What’d we miss?”

“We were just gonna play campfire games,” Hunk said. Keith went to his brother’s side, and sat down with his knees up, arms partially covered by his towel. As Hunk described the game, Keith tasted smoke on his tongue and loved how everyone’s faces were flickering in golden hues. Shiro’s sharp black hair shimmered with yellow, and he glimpsed over at Keith to share one of his winning smiles. 

Keith munched on his food and plucked grapes out of the bag that was passed around. They tossed around the idea of playing Exquisite Corpse again, and ended on another that took up the course of an entire hour. They didn’t go to sleep until the fire went out, and they had to pack up everything in the partial-dark—seeing only due to the fact that Lance was their own personal flashlight.

“He’s like one of those bioluminescent fish,” Pidge commented, and instantly Lance fell in love with the idea.

“I’m a fish! Look at the water—!” he cried out, flopping into the nearest bucket seat and throwing his arms up to the ceiling. The reflective surface of water illuminated and shimmered across the entire car. Pidge giggled and asked if she could whip out her magnifying glass to see his hand up close. None of them thought she was serious until she actually produced a pocket-sized magnifying glass. 

She flipped it open and held it just above Lance’s skin, studying the pixels and saying, “They look like oversized plant cells—Keith! Get over here—you took horticulture with me.”

“Stating the obvious again, huh?” he laughed, but went over and leaned towards the glass.

Pidge was right about it—it seemed to be the reason Keith viewed it as being a bit pixelated. It wasn’t entirely a soft edge, more like a hard, defined line between Lance and the rest of the world. Like he was Photoshopped into reality. They were seeing the distance between Lance and reality as a blank space in a Photoshop document.

“So cool,” he breathed, and Pidge murmured, “I know right. I want a sample.”

“No—No X-Acto knives—! Where did you get that!” Lance shrieked, yanking his arm away when Pidge came at him with a knife. She flicked the boxcutter to its full point.

“C’mon, I just want a hair. Come here,” she ordered. Lance _could_ have fought her off, but gave up as she wrenched his head down and lifted a strand of hair away from the others. It glistened between her fingers, and she clipped it. Keith half-expected _Tangled_ to happen, but the strand of hair stayed glowing, even when it was separated from the rest of Lance’s head. 

“There, you have your evidence,” Lance muttered bitterly, running his hands through his hair and tousling it up.

Keith took the driver’s seat because Shiro didn’t want it because of the wheel in the way, and since Hunk recently got the back seat, Pidge claimed it, and fell asleep almost on the spot, with her hair sample tucked away in one of their used, but empty plastic baggies from their food stash. She fit almost perfectly across the bench, and Hunk mumbled about how unfair it was that the back seat wasn’t longer for _them_. 

It took a while for Keith to get to sleep because he was staring at the ceiling for so long, trying to trace the water lines on the _carpeted ceiling_ —why the hell did it seem like all cars had carpet for their interiors? And the water seemed so real—he wondered where its _real_ origin was. What prompted the glow to produce a _water texture_? It was so surreal, and he fell asleep thinking about it, which just prompted water to maneuver its way into his dreams.

He woke up after an intense dream about getting lost in the ocean, and found the sunlight streaming through the front windshield. He was surprised he hadn’t woken up at all—sleeping in bucket seats wasn’t exactly _ideal_. It took a moment to realize that he woke up because Shiro’s passenger door opened, and his brother was leaning out and stepping onto the grass with bare feet. He leaned back and stretched his arms up, arching them back to grab the open edge of his door.

Keith yawned and moved to get out of the car. He rolled out of his seat, and eventually he lowered himself down onto the ground, and collapsed on the grass.

There were people up and about now, and the RV that used to be next to them was gone, so Keith took the place of it. He stared up at the sky as it gradually became brighter, and soon he was met with the side door being propped open. Hunk stepped out, and upon seeing Keith, followed along with his path. They laid next to one another, staring at the sky.

“You know,” Hunk said. “I’m really glad I got to meet you and Pidge. Before you even came to the Kappa Sigma party last year, I heard about you and thought you seemed like a cool guy.”

“Really? Where’d you hear about me?”

“Your friend—I think you went to the Kappa Sigma party with him.”

“Oh, yeah. We don’t talk about him anymore. He was pissed that I hung out with Lance all night,” Keith laughed. “He actually thought I left the party. I was just on the balcony with Lance.”

“Yeah, you two were cute. I mean, I wouldn’t admit it at the time—Lance and I weren’t talking all that much at that point—but I saw you guys when I went to get a bottle of water,” he said. With a deep sigh, he added, “That was so long ago. Can you believe we’re practically juniors now?”

“We _are_ juniors, and then we’ll all be dead. Lance beat us in that race,” Keith laughed a little. Hunk chuckled softly. “But I mean… I’m glad you and Lance are friends again. Otherwise he probably never would have introduced me to you.”

Hunk huffed, agreeing with him. They were silent as Keith tilted his head back, and saw an upside down image of Shiro walking around the hood of the car, arms crossed and observing them with a tilt to his head. “I saw you packed some oatmeal. Wanna help make it?” Shiro asked.

Keith groaned as he sat up, saying, “Sure.”

As they maneuvered over to the cooker again, they had to dig around in the trunk for Shiro’s camping pot. In the midst of making the oatmeal, Pidge and Lance woke up and gathered around the fire with them. The air felt damp, but not entirely unpleasant. There were clouds scattered over the sky after the overcast started to break apart. They ate out of plastic cups and tossed in fruit haphazardly into the oatmeal before topping it with a packet of sugar Pidge got when they were at Wall-Drug drinking coffees.

Shiro rounded them all up when breakfast was finished, and ordered that they get on the road if they planned on seeing _half_ of Yellowstone.

“First plan: we’re going to that canyon thing on the brochure,” Shiro said, pointing to the array of pamphlets they all picked up from the toll booth officers. They had a total of about twenty now, which included all the maps they picked up along the way because of Lance’s insistence on traveling via paper maps.

“Sweet! I don’t even think it’s that far,” Pidge declared, throwing open the Yellowstone map. She clamped her teeth over a marker cap, and ripped it off so she could dot the areas they were going to check off. “My brother visited Yellowstone a while back for a class thing, and he said a lot of the generic hot spring stuff is boring. So we can skip those if you guys aren’t into stagnant water in desolate areas.”

“Yeah, pass on those,” Keith muttered from the back seat. He leaned back on the chair, and reached his arm around so his hand rested on the back of Lance’s headrest. “What about Old Faithful?”

“ _Bor-ring_ ,” Pidge droned. “But okay. It’s a classic. So how ‘bout we stop there on the way out?”

“Sure. And Mammoth Hot Springs are supposed to be cool—that and there are some cool lakes around this area…” As they planned the trip, Lance, who was up front now, helped direct Shiro through the roads to navigate them towards the canyon where the waterfall was.

There were a lot of cars this time of year, and they had to wait in line for a parking spot, and Keith just felt like he was at an amusement park with all the over expensive food stands and carnival games. By the time they all filed out of the SUV, it was warm out, and he was glad he gave Lance his sweatshirt back. 

There was a lookout deck at the top of the peak, crafted from the rock face and surrounded by log fencing. Keith wasn’t entirely interested in spending long amounts of time staring at a waterfall in the distance, but Pidge and Hunk were having a blast so he stuck around. He leant up against one of the log posts, and watched Lance try and hit on a girl who was visiting the park with some of her school friends. They were from “Idaho. You know, Brigham Young?”

“Isn’t that a fancy private school?” Lance asked, and the girl giggled a little and shrugged. She had dark black hair and a freckled face, and blushed whenever Lance complimented her. Her friends were laughing in the distance, taking pictures of them rather than the waterfall in the distance.

Keith sniggered at Lance as Shiro came over to stand alongside him. “I don’t think he realizes that Brigham Young is a mostly mormon university,” Keith said to Shiro. His brother laughed.

“Emphasis on _mostly_. What do you think his chances are?”

“Slim to none,” Keith laughed, and glanced over at where Pidge shouted out loud. He saw just as she and Hunk high-five one another. Apparently they were throwing rocks off the cliff and calculating the distance down based on the number of seconds it took for them to hear the echo of it hitting a rock somewhere far down. With the continual rush of water and wind sounding in all of their ears, it was a wonder they were ever able to hear the rock hit anyway.

They left shortly after Lance got the girl’s number installed in his phone—correctly, _Keith’s_ phone. Where did he get _that_ from? There were some massive pine trees towering over the parking lot, and casting a patchwork of shaded spots across the ground. A sun spot caught on Lance’s smile as he waved it in Keith’s face. “I may be dead, but I still got game,” he boasted.

“Yeah, keep telling yourself that,” Keith laughed, snatching his phone back and stuffing it into his back pocket. “I can’t believe you.”

“What? It’s _funny_!” Lance said as Keith climbed into the back seat. “Oh, come on—!”

Keith stuck his tongue out at Lance, laughing as the others climbed in. Grumbling, Lance took the passenger’s seat again, but wouldn’t stop pouting at Keith. They put down the windows to feel the warm summer air breathe through the car, and catch in their hairs. It took a while for Keith to realize that they hadn’t opened the windows since before Wall-Drug—at least for the purpose of getting rid of the scent of chlorine.

They drove for twenty minutes listening and singing along to a song Hunk put on the stereo. It was some old 2000s song that they all knew and loved and sang all the lyrics to. They were cruising up the side of a hill when they came across a divot in the road as a form of a lookout space. Keith was almost positive all their eyes turned to look—

There was a guy on the side of the road with his thumb out, asking for a ride. 

They all got relatively quiet and looked to Shiro. Keith saw Shiro’s jaw tense from over the shoulder of his chair, and he swore he saw a sweat break out on Shiro’s forehead. After glancing quick in his side mirror, he said, “We have to.”

“ _No_ —you remember what happened last time,” Lance warned.

“But how else is he supposed to get where he needs to go?” Shiro argued.

“Shiro’s right,” Hunk said. “Turn around at the next vantage point.”

Lance leant back into his seat, muttering, “For fuck’s sake.” It took a few minutes for them to find another spot on the road where they could actually turn around, and even then it took a little while. All the while, Pidge was in the seat that was facing the side of the road where the hitchhiker was, and she kept whispering, “Oh my God. Oh my God.”

Hunk leaned over and asked, “What is it?”

She took in a deep, shaky breath, and said, “Nothing. Just a mini existential crisis. Did you guys _see_ him? Like, _actually_ see him?”

“Yeah, a little?” Keith said. “Why? Did he look like a serial killer?”

“Oh no, we’re all gonna be murdered,” Hunk moaned dreadfully, sulking in his seat. “Goodbye world, it was nice knowing you…”

“No worries guys—I bet I could take a stab or two considering I’m not even alive,” Lance said, rolling up the sleeves of his sweatshirt as if preparing to fight. 

Shiro slowed the SUV down and pulled into the parking spot at the vantage point, saying, “No one’s fighting anybody. Violence is never the answer.” Lance grumbled about it as he shove open his car door, and Pidge practically dove out her door and scrambled to her feet. Keith followed her out, and followed after Shiro as he was saying, “I mean, there’s five of us anyway, it’s not like he co—ould _holy shit—_ ”

[K](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AW4vejDcVe8)eith practically skidded to a halt, Pidge bumping into his back as they came within a few paces from the hitchhiker. [T](http://desimalemodels.com/post/147513269827)he guy turned around, and it was like the light from Heaven above came and struck them all by the absolute, blinding elegance of the man’s sculpted physiognomy. Keith held a hand out to Pidge to steady himself, and he could barely breathe for a second as the guy lowered his thumb from the road and instead held his hand out to Shiro. He had such a casual sway to his step, like someone perfectly comfortable in their own skin—

—And the real question was who could _ever_ be that confident in their own skin? If Keith had a face and body like that, he would never think twice about shaking hands with _anybody_.

“Hey, I’m looking for a ride to wherever anyone’s headed,” the guy said, and Keith faintly heard _Hunk_ , of all people, breathe out under his breath, “ _Jesus_ , his voice is like smooth chocolate.”

It was a mix of an accent that reminded Keith of his friends who came from Indian families with parents who spoke solely Hindi. He clasped a hand to his heart, and realized that he was completely burning up. He couldn’t even control his expression. The man's voice was godly, and it all reflected in his perfectly sculpted, tanned skin and the shadow of a trimmed beard. _Beautiful_.

It took a second for Shiro to catch his voice— _bless him_ for finding a way to speak because the rest of them were speechless. “Uh, yeah, we’re actually spending the day in Yellowstone and then heading to Oregon. We could—” Shiro cleared his throat, “—we could drop you off anywhere you’d… like?”

“Oregon, huh?” the guy commented, and glanced over at the rest of them, and then at the SUV. “You got room for one more?”

 _I’ve died and gone to Heaven_ , Keith thought, and looked over at Lance, who’s entire face was red. Pidge was twisting both their arms in her fists, murmuring something like, “What the hell is going on…?” Her glasses slid down her nose.

“Yes, yeah, we’ve got room for one more,” Shiro blurted out. “My name’s Shiro—my brother Keith, and his friends Pidge, Hunk, and Lance.”

The guy went around and shook all their hands, and Keith thought, _I’m never washing this hand again_. “Lovely to make your acquaintance. You can call me Ulaz.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Keith, Hunk, and Lance:  
>   
> Pidge:  
>   
> Shiro:  
> 
> 
> You'll find me in the trash can where I belong.


	17. Let's Do It

“Yeah, you can skip Old Faithful. After watching it for the past few months… yeah, gets kinda dull,” Ulaz was saying from the front seat. Shiro had practically kicked Lance’s passenger-privilege the second it came time to decide where Ulaz was going to be sitting. All of their attention was at the front where they could catch a glimpse of the man’s flawless profile. He had the nose of a Greek god, sculpted out of fine marble, but tinted a delicate shade of brown that blended with the deep black texture of his thinned beard.

He was looking at Shiro, and Keith was almost concerned for their safety because Shiro was looking at _Ulaz_ almost as much as he was looking at the road. “Really? Why’s it such a big deal then?”

“I haven’t the slightest clue,” Ulaz confessed, but then clasped his hand firmly on the armrest, saying, “Okay, that’s a lie. It’s fascinating if you’re interested in geology and the construction of geysers. _Then_ it’s rather fascinating. I studied geology and forestry in university, which is how I got the internship here now going on… a year ago now? Approximately.”

“Wait, so your internship _just_ finished?” Pidge asked, and they were all thinking the same thing. What were the chances that they could come in contact with such a godly being in such a narrow slot of time? The timing was almost _too_ perfect. And Keith tried not to think of it as another Allura situation. Allura was perfect for Pidge, up until the point where she stole a signed jersey and Hunk’s VISA.

“Yeah, oddly enough. I don’t have any plans for another month so the goal is to travel as much of the country as possible. I’ve been here since middle school, but my family never got the chance to travel around,” he explained, and leaned against his forearm more as he looked at Shiro. “So what’s your story?”

Keith bit into his lip and rose both eyebrows at Lance, who turned to him and started wiggling his around in that wave-formation again. 

From this angle, they could see Ulaz’s piercings, and the gold ring that linked to one pinching the upper part of his ear lobe. He had a septum piercing that curved along the top edge of his mustache. They faintly heard Shiro clear his throat a little before saying, “Um, well—we’re all from Minnesota for the most part. I graduated from the University of Minnesota about two years ago and I work mainly in… the aerospace industry. Designing aircrafts and… stuff.”

“Incredible. What’d you major in then?” he asked, propping his chin up on his fist. Maybe it was to show off his _obviously_ toned arms—Keith wasn’t sure. Ulaz was wearing a flannel at the time, underneath a vest and over his printed undershirt. 

“Mechanical engineering,” Shiro said. 

“Amazing. Have you always wanted to be an engineer?”

“More or less,” he answered with a soft smile, glancing over at Ulaz before turning back to the road and asking, “So we should turn here?”

“Oh my God,” Lance whispered, soto voce. “This is the hottest interaction I’ve ever witnessed,” he said as quietly as possible to Keith, who snorted and elbowed him in the side. Hunk must have heard it, because he laughed a little and told them to shut up. “And I thought Shiro was hot.”

“He is _not_ ,” Keith hissed, slapping Lance harder. “That’s my _brother_ you’re talking about.”

“I know,” he grinned, wiggling his eyebrows at Keith again.

Keith shoved him again, laughing, and a moment later they were slowing to a stop and attempting to find parking on the side of the road. Shiro and Ulaz were non-stop talking, and the rest of them were non-stop fan-girling over the perfect match. Keith never thought there’d come a day where he was so thoroughly obsessed with a _guy_ Shiro was _interested in_. 

It was such a bizarre concept that it almost felt surreal. Keith never even pictured Shiro being able to _flirt_. 

But here they were.

It took three trips to a few geysers and a waterfall for them to walk back to the SUV and witness Shiro and Ulaz absolutely fawning over each other. It was the most ridiculous thing Keith ever witnessed. They had the pairing of gasoline and something sharp—almost like an alcohol Keith wasn’t entirely familiar with. There was definitely a sweet side to Ulaz that Keith would die for—not just the way he acted, but the fragrance of super sweet cherries. The sort Keith would pour by the handfuls into his casual drinks. 

Shiro and Ulaz always took the longest to get back to the SUV, so the rest of them were all hidden behind the tinted windows shrieking, “ _Oh_ my _God!_ Are you seeing this right now?!” “They fucking did it! They’re holding hands oh my God my heart—Keith, catch me, I’m swooning.”

Keith practically had a death-grip on Lance’s arm when Shiro ducked into the driver’s seat, only to become the center of all their hopeful gazes. He slammed his door, aware that Ulaz was still walking around the vehicle to his side. 

“Shut up,” Shiro hissed at them, which just made them all giggle hysterically.

“I’m so turned on right now…” Lance murmured, giggling against Keith’s ear. He gasped and slapped Lance’s leg _hard_ , which just caused Hunk to scream with laughter. 

All it took for them to come back to themselves was Ulaz saying, “Wow, did I miss something?” 

Keith hid his face against Lance’s sweatshirt as Pidge hollered, “No, no! Carry on, we’re just messing around. What were you saying about your work earlier? What did you do here?”

“I worked on nature conservation, mostly. Habitat management, that sort of thing,” he explained. “I was a part of a team of people from across the country, and a few international students. A lot of it was monitoring vegetation growth in the areas where the fires took out a huge portion of the forests. And depending on which way you go out of Wyoming, you might be able to see them. They all just look like… toothpicks stuck in the dirt—those are the dead trees.”

“What fire?” she asked.

“It happened in 1988, and it affected almost forty percent of the park,” he explained. “It’s interesting because a lot of people view it as a terrible thing, and yeah, we lost a few of our destinations, but it’s the cycle of the forests. Forest fires are necessary for the overall wellbeing of the ecosystem for future generations. It’s basically… I would describe it as a pre-winter-break cleaning. Where your dorm is just a disaster, you haven’t cleaned your bed sheets since the beginning of the year, and all the shit you dropped behind your desk needs to be recovered. The wildfires do that because of all the debris build up on the forest floor—

“—and then it all catches on fire one day and that’s that,” he finished, giving them a winning smile towards the back, and then turning up front to add to Shiro. “But the forest grows back stronger than before with the ash as fertilizer. It’s incredible. The entire forest right now is at a quarter of the height it will be in a few decades.”

“Riveting,” Lance breathed out, and added to Keith, voice incredibly quiet, “I would _so_ pay good money to see a porno of your brother and Ulaz.”

“And I would literally kill you if I ever saw that lying around,” Keith said, gawking at Lance as he jabbed him in the rib again. Lance giggled and collapsed over Keith. They fell to the side as they listened to Ulaz talk about nature. This was better than any Morgan Freeman nature segment on cable television.

“After the fires, though, they barely needed to replant anything because there’s these flowers we call fireweeds, and they thrived after the fires died out. And since there wasn’t a canopy to block out the sunlight, the entire forest just became a huge wildflower field. Honestly I wish I could’ve seen it, but, ya know—it was 1988. I wasn’t even born yet.”

“What about the trees?” Shiro asked.

“They grew shortly after. A lot of their seeds were dispersed below the point that the fires touched the soil, so the seeds were mostly saved. I think the fires actually only affected less than an inch of the soil—maybe even half an inch?” He thought for a moment, scratching at his beard for a moment. “Yeah, less than half an inch. But anyway, the real problem is that now aspens are taking over the ecosystem. Before it we had widespread gymnosperms—wait, you know what—”

“Pine trees! Pine trees,” Pidge and Keith practically shouted, and promptly challenged one another with sharp glares. Eventually, Keith said, “Specifically conifers.” Pidge groaned, throwing her arms up and shouting, “I _told you_ that you always memorized things better than I did in that class.”

“What class?” Ulaz asked, and Pidge promptly sat up straighter again.

“It’s a propagation course—horticulture, I guess. We had to take it for our gen. eds,” she explained.

“Oh, that’s cool. It’s cool that your school offers that,” he commented. “I had to take a plant propagation course my first year in college. My professor was obsessed with hot peppers—he was doing an experiment that involved over a hundred different species of hot peppers.”

“That’s an oddly specific thing to remember about your professor,” Shiro laughed. 

“Yeah, but then again he talked about it _every lecture_.” This just prompted Shiro to tell him about a professor he had who would play music at the start of class, and it would have been great had it not been polka music. 

As they talked and Shiro turned the car down to the next parking lot, Keith muttered, “I can’t believe you said you’d buy a porno with my _brother_ in it.”

“I can see where you’d get disgusted by it, but the rest of the world would appreciate it,” Lance whispered, and promptly kissed Keith’s cheek. He scrubbed it off with the side of his fist before punching Lance in the arm. “Ouchy! Stop abusing me—”

“Okay, we’re here! Everyone out—it’s a bit of a walk this time,” Shiro called out. 

They all climbed out and packed a backpack with water in it before heading out. As they started heading out, Ulaz said, “Are you sure it’s all right for me to join you all to Oregon? I’m more than willing to pay for gas and my own food.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Shiro said. Keith thought about how logical it was to start giving free rides to people, but his irrational side completely dismissed that idea. Ulaz was indisputably godly—it just seemed like an obligation to provide him with anything he could ever want. 

They started their hike to the lake destination, and passed tourists on the way there. Pidge tried her best to keep up, but ultimately fell behind with Keith and Lance. Eventually Hunk ducked out of the conversation Shiro and Ulaz were having in favor of conspiring with the rest of them, watching from afar as their older guardian flirted with the awe-inspiring, cherry- and alcohol-smelling being known as Ulaz. 

The scent must have been strong enough for Lance to smell it, because eventually in the midst of being ordered to smell a flower Pidge found, he straightened up and furrowed his brows. “I dunno—I keep smelling whiskey. And, like… maraschino cherries. Does it smell like cherries?” Lance asked.

Pidge gave him a weird look, and Keith instantly bolted forward, holding a hand to Lance’s arm as he said, “Wait—so that’s whiskey? I wasn’t sure what it was—”

“Yeah, it’s totally a whiskey old fashion. My parents are all about it—it’s huge in Wisconsin,” Lance said.

“What are you guys talking about?” Hunk asked, and promptly corrected Lance: “Your parents _don’t_ drink whiskey old fashions. One time your mom said something about them tasting terrible. I don’t even think she likes whiskey.”

“Oh, then brandy maybe? She likes brandy old fashions, my bad,” Lance said. “But this is definitely whiskey.”

“I don’t smell anything,” Pidge whined. “Is this another telepathetic thing you guys are doing?” Keith rolled his eyes, and Lance gasped when he realized that must be the case.

“You know, come to think of it: I don’t think I’ve been smelling a whole lot? Like, all the food I’ve been eating is kinda bland compared to your brother’s car freshener or whatever,” he confessed, which caused Keith to quirk an eyebrow up, and Hunk to say, “I haven’t seen a car freshener around.”

“But it smells _really_ good. Like my childhood—when we used to eat Froot Loops every day,” he said, and folded his hands over his stomach. “Aw, well now I’m hungry. Everyone smells like Froot Loops.”

“That’s just Pidge and Hunk—they smell like Skittles and pineapples,” Keith said, laughing. “How long have you been smelling them?”

“Ever since that last brownie piece,” he confessed, pouting at Keith. “Is this seriously what you smell all the time? It makes me so hungry.”

“Then I’m guessing you’ve been smelling gasoline and thinking it’s the car,” he chuckled, and he couldn’t contain his laughter. It was just so hilarious, having to deal with someone who could smell everything he could, and not be able to do anything about it. He couldn’t imagine what that would be like, similar to how he couldn’t imagine a life where people didn’t smell like Froot Loops or chlorine.

“Oh—that’s just Shiro,” Lance mused aloud, tapping his finger to his chin. After a moment of silence, he said, “Then the fresh rain is you, and my mom is minty dark chocolate. And… sometimes I smell something stale?”

“That’s Michael. He smells like used socks—but not nasty gym socks. Just… old socks,” he explained, and Hunk laughed so hard he slammed his knee and had to recover by brushing a finger under his eyes.

It just got worse when Lance patted Keith on the shoulder and said, “Hey, you know what? I just sort of feel like I’m on drugs when I’m with you, and now that quote is more relevant than ever. Thanks buddy.”

Pidge gawked at him, as if she never expected _Lance_ to be cool enough to watch her all-time favorite movie. “Oh, my God—I can’t believe you know _Scott Pilgrim_ ,” she gasped.

“I can’t believe you called me ‘buddy,’” Keith said, honestly offended. 

Pidge slapped her hand over her heart, and fake-sobbed for a second, walking ahead of them to gather her bearings again. It ended with a dull cry out into the forest before she gripped her hair and yelled, “ _Ramona—!_ ” and again, softer, in a mere whisper, “I’m in lesbians with you…!”

Lance let out a surprised laugh, and glanced over at Keith for the reason behind it. “You should know better than to bring up _Scott Pilgrim_ in front of Pidge,” he scolded Lance. 

Later, when they reached the lake, Pidge climbed up onto a rock. Keith stood out on the peak, and lifted his sunglasses up to see the view better. He could see Shiro and Ulaz being rebels and climbing down to the water’s edge—so of course Lance tried to do the same and ignored the worried shouts of Hunk. 

In the midst of forgetting that Ulaz wasn’t entirely acclimated to their group, Lance called back to Hunk, “Why the hell are you worrying about me? I’m already dead!”

“ _Lance_! Jesus,” Keith hissed out, and Lance stood up on top of a rock and said, “Wha—? Oh, oops.”

But Ulaz wasn’t really paying attention. He held his hands up to help Shiro down from the rock, just a second before Keith was startled into tripping on the pebbles when Pidge shouted at the top of her lungs, “ _IF YOUR LIFE HAD A FACE I’D PUNCH IT!_ ”

Distantly, they heard Lance reply back, “Thanks!”

Keith slapped his hand onto the side of Pidge’s boulder, muttering, “Fuck’s sake,” under his breath. 

Pidge cupped her hands over her mouth and started shouting, “You’re pretentious! This club _sucks!_ ” and Lance joined in with, “I have _beef!_ Let’s _do it!_ ”

They chanted the quote again, hearing their voices echo across the lake and the water and all the trees around them. They could see the Grand Tetons rising up in the distance, beyond the rolling foothills, and the sound of Pidge yelling, “ _THAT’S IT! YOU COCKY COCK—YOU’LL PAY FOR YOUR CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY—!_ ”

Hunk was laughing so hard he slipped a little on the rocks and had to sit down. Keith dragged his hand down the side of his face and groaned, “I’m gonna regret this…” just before taking a deep breath and yelling, “ _WE DON’T USE THE ‘E’ WORD IN THIS HOUSE!_ ”

He was accompanied by Lance’s echo coming back, “ _If I peed my pants would you pretend that I just got wet from the rain?!_ ”

“ _It isn’t even raining!_ ” Keith and Pidge yelled, voices cracking. 

“I was just a little _bi-curious!_ ” Lance screamed, to which Pidge shouted, voice breaking along the way, “Yeah?! Well I’m a little _bi-FURIOUS!_ ”

“ _Kick her in the balls!_ ” Someone shouted from down by the shore, and they saw Ulaz lowering his hands from his mouth, smirking up at them. Keith slapped his hands on his legs, crying from laughter. He was startled by a sneak-attack from Pidge lunging onto his back. He staggered forward, and started the safer trek down to the water with Pidge on his back, laughing and squeezing him around the shoulders.

Later that day, after Keith thought all the quotes were worn out they sat around the campfire when it wasn’t even dark out, they decided to eat an semi-late dinner. There was a fancy loaf of French bread packed away that Shiro sliced up, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches were passed around on toasted bread. 

Pidge tore into her bread, and froze when Lance casually said, “Garlic bread is my favorite food. I could honestly eat it for every meal.”

“You’d get fat,” Ulaz said, smirking with his lips against his sandwich.

“No, why would I get fat?” Lance remarked, already laughing.

“Bread makes you fat.”

“ _Bread makes you fat?!_ ” both he and Pidge gasped. And quite honestly, their voices were a little raspy still from yelling into the abyss. They probably yelled at every destination after that lake, just for shits and giggles. It left their throats raw and their voices hoarse, but that just made them all laugh harder.

Keith was almost positive they hadn’t had a greater day than this. Ulaz was the perfect tour guide, and it wasn’t just because he always had their undivided attention. He knew everything about the park, and even offered to take them on an exertion that night to watch the stars. They spent a good portion of the night hearing the hiss of steam from the hot springs, and the smell of sulfur in the air. None of them were really phased by the smell, even when Ulaz warned them about it—they were all used to high doses of chlorine anyway.

They could see… everything up here. In California, Keith only ever got to see the stars when they took trips up north. But it was nothing compared to this. Or perhaps it was how clear this would be in his memories—eventually this view would fade from his memories like the stars in northern California. It was a warm, embracing moment, being able to spend it with everyone he ever cared about, and with his hand clasped in Lance’s. He wondered about just how many more times he’d be able to hold Lance’s hand again like this. When was the last time he ever held hands with _real_ Lance? 

The Lance before Keith _really_ knew him?

Keith swallowed hard, turning his chin up and looking far behind them, until he could see the horizon line and where the stars faded against the atmospheric distortion. He didn’t want to forget this, but that was how brains worked. Soon, this would all just be… a fond memory, and one that couldn’t be recalled in such vivid detail anymore. That was probably how they talked about Lance at his funeral. The funeral Keith never went to. They probably talked about Lance as he was—never in the present because the present Lance was nonexistent. They could remember him fondly, but they could never remember him in perfect, exquisite detail like they could now.

Someone sat up a little, and the scent of maraschino cherries spiked in the back of Keith’s mind. “Does someone have their phone on? It’s not as great when there’s light.”

“Uh… hm…” Pidge started, her question turning into an awkward squeak. Keith was fairly positive they all flinched.

Lance was about to sit up, but wondered if that would just give him away. He was glowing like he did every night, but it was particularly noticeable now that they were in the pitch black of northern Wyoming, and the fact that everyone’s eyes were on him. He sat up slowly, eyes wide and not quite meeting Ulaz’s.

“Um…” Ulaz started, and swallowed hard after. “My… vision must be weird, but—”

“It’s not weird,” Lance started, his hoarse throat failing him. He cleared it, but Shiro finished for him.

“It’s kind of hard to explain,” he said, sitting up. Ulaz was starting to stand up, brow furrowing. Keith had never seen someone so perfectly perplexed before. “It’s just—He has…?”

“Glow-in-the-dark clothes,” Hunk finished. “Yeah, and he just has a really good skin care routine so it gives the illusion that his skin glows.”

“Right! Exactly. Took the words right out of my mouth,” Lance said, and offered a winning smile.

“Uh…” Ulaz was on his feet now, looking at them all bizarrely. They were on one of those boardwalks that went out to the middle of the hot springs, and Keith was honestly worried that Ulaz would faint and swoon straight into a boiling pit of water. “Th-those are _not_ glow in the dark clothes—D-Did you guys put something in my _water?_ ” 

“What?” Shiro blurted out, scrambling to his feet as Ulaz started to walk away, but not without looking back at Lance approximately twenty times. “No—we didn’t put _anything_ in your drink—”

“Then why the hell is he _glowing_?” Ulaz yelled. “Are you guys insane?”

Shiro didn’t seem to have an answer to that, because they were all pretty insane for driving a dead man across the United States. Instead, Shiro shrugged, which just drove Ulaz to storm down the boardwalk. Shiro hesitated, staring after him before looking back at the rest of them. Keith instantly gestured frantically for Shiro to go after him, and Hunk and Pidge followed suit. So Shiro kicked himself into gear and followed after Ulaz, their heavy footsteps creaking the floorboards and fading into the distance.

It took a moment for any of them to say _anything_. Eventually, Lance breathed out, “I fucked up. I forgot about the glow-y thing.”

“Well, if Ulaz was—correction, _is_ , because we can’t just let a guy like that slip through Shiro’s fingers—” Hunk said, and followed up with a look that said, “Right guys? Right?” He continued, “if he _is_ going to come with us, he would have found out eventually. I mean, he’s gonna be sleeping in the car with us—that entire glow-y thing is like a disco ball on the ceiling.”

“It’s not your fault, Lance,” Keith said, and pushed himself to his feet with a groan. “I’m gonna check on them. Suffice to say this star-watching adventure is over.”

“I like stargazing though…” Lance moaned, slinking into the comfort of his jacket hood until Hunk forced him to his feet with one great-big heave. Lance swayed onto his feet and followed after Keith, who was already half-back to the SUV.

They came to the empty parking lot and found Ulaz standing with his arms crossed, facing the road. Shiro was trying to talk to him, but stopped when he saw Keith approaching. Keith cleared his throat and said, “Hey Ulaz.”

The man glanced briefly at Keith and said, “Your brother says your… friend committed suicide.” With that, his eyes flickered over to where Lance and the others were walking back. “If that’s true, I’m sorry to hear that.”

“It is true,” Keith said, and came to stand beside Ulaz. There wasn’t much on the other side of the road except trees shrouded in darkness. “Lance and I were roommates. He went home before finals to see his family and… passed away five days later. We were… _really_ close, so it hurt. Almost two weeks later he just randomly showed up again and,” he took in a deep breath, because it was hard to talk about something he could barely comprehend to begin with. “Well, it’s kinda hard to explain. Because I don’t really get it either, but he showed up looking for his phone but his parents already took everything out of the apartment. And now Lance glows in the dark and is looking for his parents, so we’re trying to take him there. They live in Oregon now, so… that’s the destination.

“But we think it might have something to do with my synesthesia. I associate smells with people, so that’s why he smells like chlorine all the time—” he started, but Ulaz stopped him. Up until that point, it hardly looked like Ulaz was listening.

“Wait—chlorine? He doesn’t smell like chlorine,” he said quickly, and Keith was too thrown-off to answer. “Synesthesia only affects the individual, right? So that doesn’t make sense to begin with.”

Everyone was quiet, Hunk, Pidge, and Lance having stopped a few paces back. Keith stared at the road, eyes wide. Were they all just insane? But Keith… wasn’t smelling the chlorine as strongly as before. It was faint, like Lance’s name usually was. He hadn’t noticed it because he figured… he was just getting used to the strong acidity of it. 

“Yeah, I don’t smell it much anymore,” Pidge finally said, causing Ulaz to turn around. “Remember? We used to keep the car windows open all the time because it was suffocating.”

Lance sniffed his jacket and shrugged. “I’ve never been able to smell it, so I dunno.”

“It’s definitely still there, though,” Keith said. “Lance still smells like chlorine to me—”

“Yeah, but maybe it’s just you again now,” Pidge said. “Like, I thought we all just got used to the horrible smell of him—no offense Lance—but… maybe it’s fading?”

She left it open-ended, which just led Keith to fill in the blank. _Maybe he’s fading away_.

“What?” Hunk said, quietly. “He can’t be fading away—we haven’t gotten to Oregon yet!”

“You all are… _insane_ ,” Ulaz said, and turned away and stormed down the road. Keith called after him to stop, but he just kept walking. Shiro dragged his hands down his face, and Pidge tried to rationalize it some more. Keith couldn’t even be sure what she was saying, because then Lance suddenly shouted—

“No wait! Ulaz, I can prove I’m not alive!” He started running over to where Ulaz was, taking his shimmering blue outline with him. Keith chased after him, but stopped when Lance shooed him away, his eyes calmer than ever. “Trust me, just let me talk to him for a second,” Lance ordered. Keith stopped, and so did Ulaz, a few paces up the road. 

After a moment of worrying over it, Keith nodded and turned away, heading back to the group. He felt… lightheaded. Talking about Lance like he wasn’t even there made him dizzy with the idea that Lance really _wasn’t_ there. Maybe they were all _insane_. 

It took a few minutes of watching the faint glow of Lance up the road. The stars made it easier to see everything around them, and after the initial darkness of Lance running away from them, everything became brighter. Keith could see all the way down the boardwalk to where they’d been laying surrounded by deadly water and sulfur springs. They could smell the rotten eggs in the air, and see the sky between the branches of the trees and the sway of leaves going along with the wind.

Keith could see everything in monochromatic blues and blacks and grays. He could see his brother with his arms crossed, and found it hilarious. He didn’t know why he found it hilarious—perhaps it was just a sibling response to seeing his brother fret over someone he was interested in, and just met that day.

He saw Hunk trying to reconcile with the fact that maybe Lance _was_ fading. They couldn’t smell the chlorine anymore—maybe that meant the end of Lance. Or maybe it meant something else entirely. Keith could tell Pidge was theorizing about it, and hypothesizing, plotting, planning. She had her fingers pinched over her bottom lip, and she plucked at it in thought.

Eventually, they saw Lance walking back, and it took a second to differentiate his form from Ulaz’s walking down the road. Instantly everyone perked up, and Lance threw his arms up when he was close enough, and announced, “Save your applause, save your applause.”

“Wait—so—?” Shiro started, raising an eyebrow as Ulaz stood alongside Lance, arms crossed and not looking entirely happy, but there.

“I believe him,” he said with a shrug. “So what campsite lot are you guys staying at? I can show you the way.”

“Are you sticking with us for Oregon?” Pidge asked, seeing as Shiro looked to hesitant to do so.

Ulaz shrugged again, and this time a smirk came to his lips. “Well, yeah, I want to see how this pans out. You all are insane, but if that’s true, then I might as well be, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This ended up WAY longer than intended. I think the Scott Pilgrim stuff put me over. If you can't tell, that's pretty much my new favorite movie for the time being. 
> 
> Tell me your theories about Lance! Because _I_ know what he's all about, but I dunno just how many hints I've dropped along the way. There's quite a few. Also, what do you think his proof was?


	18. Peer Pressure

“So… every night is like this?” Ulaz asked from the passenger’s seat. Keith could see that his eyes were on the ceiling, studying the pattern of water like they studied the stars.

“Yeah. I’m surprised no one’s come by and told us to turn off the lights,” Shiro confessed. “That one night—it was the first night on this trip. It was like _daylight_. It was so damn bright.”

“That’s because Hunk gave Lance an entire brownie,” Pidge grumbled, half-asleep.

“An entire brownie?” Ulaz repeated. “Please tell me that isn’t what I think it is.”

“Oh, it is, trust me,” she said.

“It was on accident! It wasn’t _my_ fault they cooked them in the same pan as the actual pot brownies,” Hunk whined, voice muffled by his pillow. Keith laughed from the back seat where he and Lance were squeezed together. It wouldn’t be a perfect fit, which was why Keith eventually ended up on the ground with his head cushioned by the pillow folded between the back seat, and the bucket seat beside his head.

But before that happened, Ulaz breathed out, “That’s actually… really cool. I’m okay with this.”

Keith felt Lance smile against his collarbone. _Officially validated by the hottest man on the planet—that must do wonders for his self-esteem_ , Keith thought to himself. His arm was underneath Lance and wrapped around his shoulders, but it was already starting to go numb with the way they were laying.

They all fell asleep shortly after that, and woke up hours later to the sunlight streaming in through the tinted windows. Keith didn’t quite wake up to that—the light wasn’t so prominent from the floor. Instead, he woke up to Lance tickling the tip of his nose. He scrunched his face up and brushed Lance’s hand away. 

One of the side doors opened, and let in a stream of white light splaying over Lance’s torso. Fresh air drifted in, and Keith breathed it in as he stretched his arms up, chest arching off the ground. His jaws parted, and he yawned for a good few seconds before coming back to the world, his vision momentarily going hazy.

Everyone got out of the vehicle for breakfast at the campfire. Keith loved the smell of burning wood in the morning, so long as it was restricted to a campfire. It was warm and cozy, and even when they were all relatively dead inside, it was nice. Keith’s back was starting to complain from sleeping in bucket seats and the car floor, though.

Pidge laid in the grass for a while, and ate bite after bite from the cup at her side. They had raisins in their oatmeal that day, along with cut up grapes and their diminishing supply of raspberries. They kept accidentally opening the boxes of them to snack on in the car. 

Ulaz was over by the vehicle, and reached inside to pull out Bean from the dashboard. “I noticed this yesterday. Where’d you get this jackalope?”

“It was a dark day in history…” Lance started, flopping back onto the grass beside Pidge. Ulaz rose an eyebrow at him before looking at Shiro for clarification. 

“After we bought the jackalope, someone stole Hunk’s debit card,” he explained, and Ulaz murmured his apologies as he put Bean back where she belonged on the car dash.

To recover the mood, Ulaz changed subjects. “Have you guys tried sleeping outside the car yet?” Ulaz asked, and they all shook their heads. “Why not?”

“Mostly because we park at truck stops. Concrete isn’t exactly the greatest thing to sleep on,” Pidge said. “And the tent we have is too small for all of us.” Keith remembered a time when he and Lance were prepared to go on this trip on their own. That just seemed odd now. 

“We don’t need a tent,” he said. “We just need sleeping bags.”

“And… those are expensive,” she said, pouting. “We didn’t really plan everything out. It all happened in a day for… me, Hunk, and Shiro.”

“What do you mean?” he asked, eyebrows furrowing as he looked to the rest of them. For whatever reason, Keith felt like Pidge called them out on something, and he wasn’t sure if it was a good thing. So he bowed his head, a little guilty about it. 

Lance spoke up, “Well, I mean, I told Keith I wanted to see my parents and when he said they were in Oregon, I badgered him into taking a road trip with me after his finals were done. We planned for just the two of us, since… I can’t really go around asking people to come on a trip with me. It was hard enough when Hunk and Pidge caught us.” 

Lance dove into the story of when Keith and Lance thought they were in the clear. When they had Shiro’s SUV, and all their bags packed and ready to go. It was an elaborate story, and Keith nearly forgot how excellent of a storyteller Lance was. He remembered house parties where they’d sit around a coffee table, smoking, drinking, and telling stories about “the good ol’ days.” Lance had _tons_ of stories about him and his siblings causing trouble, and hearing about them through Lance’s words seemed to make them twice as good.

And if Lance was a good storyteller, his next best counterpart was Ulaz, and that man just seemed enthralled by everything Lance said. Ever since the previous night, Ulaz had a fascination with Lance that none of them could get over. He was just a phenomenon that they all got the chance to spend time with. It definitely succeeded in boosting Lance’s ego, so he soaked up all the attention when it came to telling stories about him being a ghost of sorts.

When it came time to hit the road, though, Lance jumped to the chase, saying, “I want to drive!” 

“Hell. No. No way,” Shiro said, getting up from the ground. Lance bolted to his feet, and before Shiro realized it was a race, Lance was already at the driver’s door. “You can’t _drive—_ ”

“Can too!” Lance hollered. “Besides, it’s so _boring_ sitting in the back seat. I’ve been driving for as many years as _you_ have, anyway!”

Shiro pegged Lance with a glare before turning it on Keith. “You told him?” he all but hissed. Keith ducked his head down so his shoulders pushed up to his ears. 

“He may or may not have said something about you being a nervous wreck about driving. I’m surprised you’ve driven all this way anyway…” Lance goaded, swinging his hips back and forth. Shiro just narrowed his eyes at Lance, all the while furious with Keith. He could feel it, somewhere deep down where that pit of gasoline waited to be burned. 

Shiro was such a worry-wart as a kid that driving just seemed like the ultimate death sentence. Even after the point where taking the lessons would be free, Shiro waited until he _needed_ to drive for his first internship. He was twenty while Lance was sixteen getting his driver’s permit in Wisconsin.

Keith could hear Hunk praying, “Please don’t let him drive—please don’t let him drive— _”_

 _“Fine_. Just this once,” Shiro said, and reached in his pocket for the keys. Lance yelped in excitement and snatched the keys the second they came into view. He hurried into the driver’s seat and started adjusting the seat and the mirrors. 

Shiro sighed, and made a point to glare at Keith, only to blush when Ulaz said, “It took you _four years_ to finally get your license?” 

Pidge snorted, just now becoming fully awake. 

Shiro’s ears went red at the tips, and he stammered to justify himself. “I—Cars are—Driving is dangerous! More people die while driving a vehicle than by gunfire every year, okay? It’s a logical decision, and financially it made sense.” He said it so fast, and just as quickly, he disappeared into the back of the SUV. 

Pidge giggled from the side, which drew Keith’s attention over to her. “Your brother’s funny,” she said. He scowled at her, and reached across the grass to shove her in the head.

They all piled into the car and set off for Idaho. It was a matter of driving towards Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where they stopped to eat lunch in the central park. They stopped by a gem shop and reminisced about the time they stole rocks from the mini kiosk. Keith still had the amber-colored one Lance gave him, and Lance still had his, stuffed somewhere in the pocket of his jacket. 

The gem shop had large, open windows and was positioned in a small square with brick sidewalks, and old fashioned western storefronts. They could see the central park area, with the massive archways crafted out of antlers. Lance and Keith separated from the others to check out a cowboy hat store. 

It was cramped in there, and all across the ceilings, walls, and stacked on boxes off of the floor, there were just… _hats_. Keith had never seen so many hats before, and Lance was adamant on trying all of them on—on _Keith_. They landed on _The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly_ black cowboy hat, which Keith tipped at him and tsked with his tongue. “Such in _gratitude_. After all the times I saved yo’ life,” he quoted in a southern accent.

Lance giggled and swooned into Keith. “Oh, how will I ever repay you.”

“Well, the be fair, you’re already dead so I guess it was all for naught,” Keith said with a roll of his eyes. 

Lance perked back up, arms strewn around his neck. His face got serious, and rather intimidating as he pegged Keith with a jab to the chest, saying, “It’s not your fault I died. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Yeah, well—it’s kind of hard to convince someone of that when you’re already gone,” Keith argued, tipping their foreheads together. Their noses brushed beside one another. 

“I’m serious, Keith. You didn’t do anything wrong,” Lance said, and Keith pointedly turned his attention elsewhere—mostly to the rest of the store in hopes the elderly lady running the place didn’t see them like this. Lance grabbed him by the chin and forced him to look Lance in the eyes. “You did everything right, Keith.”

Every now and then Keith felt the lump in his throat randomly. Like he was trying so hard not to cry. It came back again, for good reason this time, but he silenced the aching of it to push his lips into Lance’s. They melted together, even when his cowboy hat fell off behind them, and Lance frantically caught it. Their kissing stumbled when he did that, and Keith laughed, surprised he could even do that when it felt like someone was strangling him around the throat.

Lance stuffed the hat onto his head and said, “Can we get it?”

“I am _not_ buying a fifty dollar cowboy hat. These things are ex _pensive_ ,” Keith said sharply, glaring at Lance as he snatched the hat back and hooked it back onto the ceiling beam. Lance pouted at him, and tried unsuccessfully to get Keith to waste fifty dollars by kissing Keith all over the neck and face even when Keith tried to wave him off.

His giddy giggles were interrupted by Hunk entering the premises in search of them. “C’mon guys! We’re heading out now.”

“Hunk, _please please pleeease_ buy me a cowboy hat?” Lance whined, arching back with his hands around Keith’s neck, so he could see Hunk upside down. “Keith looks cute in them and so do I.”

“We aren’t buying a cowboy hat. Now come on,” Hunk demanded, but Lance just kept begging and begging. “Maybe if I had my VISA, but I’m not spending cash on a cowboy hat,” he confessed, looking guilty. 

Lance pouted and muttered, “You’re right…” and slumped after Hunk. Keith lingered behind for a moment, which really, in retrospect, was what did it. He grabbed the hat he thought looked best on him and Lance, and went up to the cashier to pay for it. Nearly forty dollars went down the drain for an authentic cowboy hat. Great.

Keith walked out of the shop with his sunglasses shaded by the brim of his new hat. 

When he joined up with the rest of the group, round hat box tucked under his arm, Pidge snorted and slapped her hands over her mouth to keep from laughing out loud. But the sound of it drew Shiro and Ulaz’s attention over to where Keith walked up wearing a cowboy hat. “You didn’t— _Keith_ …” Shiro complained, and Ulaz laughed, saying, “You look good.”

Lance turned around, and shrieked, lunging for Keith with little to no warning. Keith caught him, staggering a little with Lance’s spindly legs wrapped around his waist. “ _You got the hat!_ ” Lance cried out.

“This is just another Bean situation…” Shiro warned. “You guys _begged_ us to buy that thing! Now we have a jackalope head on our dashboard!”

“Yeah, but Bean is a classic, and this hat is a classic. Isn’t it dramatic?” Lance asked, and swiped the hat off Keith’s head to perch it atop his own. Shiro rolled his eyes and said that if Lance wanted to keep driving, he couldn’t wear the cowboy hat. So the hat went back on Keith’s head, and he claimed the passenger’s seat. Ulaz and Shiro took the bucket seats, and Hunk and Pidge wrestled over the back seat before ended with Pidge’s legs propped up on Hunk’s lap.

Lance cranked the car into drive, and they pulled out of their parking spot and hopped onto the road that would cut through the Grand Tetons. As those sharp peaks grew closer, and the forests began to scatter at the bottom of them, they were all leaning their heads out the windows as best they could to see the tops of the peaks. Ulaz was talking about how he and a few of his friends from Yellowstone would go hiking in the mountains.

The road took them in the valley of the mountains and around the rocky edges. There were parts of the road where they came to the very edge of the cliff—nearly the entire trip involved little to no shoulder to catch them if they fell. Hunk was a crying mess in the back seat, and forced Pidge to switch places with him so he wouldn’t have to see down the cliff.

“Geez, relax—Lance is a pretty good driver, right?” Pidge said, but Shiro had his hands over his eyes, and Ulaz just looked like he was having the time of his life sticking his head out the window, arms up and out. There was something about Lance driving that just spiked all of their anxiety and adrenaline, which confirmed the theory that Ulaz was an adrenaline junkie.

Keith was too calm to even bother with it, because thirty minutes prior he asked for one of Hunk’s brownies. He split half of it with Ulaz—so maybe that was why Ulaz was acting the way he was. Either way, Keith knew he’d be a mess if he wasn’t high on _something_. “Lance is a great driver,” Keith drawled, patting his hand on Lance’s shoulder. “Right?”

“Yeah, totally. Isn’t this gr—whoa! River guys! Check it out!” Lance hollered, causing Keith to jump and look out the window. His cowboy hat tipped a little, and his eyes went wide as he adjusted it and stared down the cliff towards the water below.

“Can we go down there?” Ulaz asked. “C’mon, it’ll be fun—I brought climbing gear!”

“Are you serious right now?” Shiro muttered under his breath.

“Let’s go down to the river, guys,” Keith begged. “It’ll be… _fun_.” 

They cut into a flat valley that was surrounded by the U-shape of the mountains, and they found the river cutting along the side of the valley, between the rocks and descending from the road they were approaching on. It ran alongside the road several dozen feet down the cliffside, and so Keith and Ulaz ordered that Lance park the car somewhere once they were in the valley, so they could see how far upstream they could get into the mountains. It was just a little snake of a river, but it was exciting nonetheless. And it wasn’t all that treacherous, so Hunk joined them despite his protests.

They all climbed out of the car after parking on the now-available shoulder of the road. Lance slapped the keys into Shiro’s hands so he could chase after Ulaz and Keith. They were chasing each other to the water, sprinting across the side road beside them, and over the bridge. Keith leaned over the edge, only to be yanked back by his brother warning him not to fall into the water. It looked muddy anyways, but that didn’t stop Ulaz from kicking off his boots and rolling up his shorts. 

“Keith! Give me your phone, I wanna take pictures,” Lance cried out when Keith started discarding his shoes on the side of the road. He dug into his pocket and practically threw his phone at Lance before taking off onto the declining, grassy hill to the sandy riverbed. 

Keith navigated his way down with a hand on the edge of the hill that seemed to have eroded away. Ulaz was already down by the water, yelping at the cold. “ _God_ , it’s freezing! So cold! So cold!” he yelled, feet jumping out of the water. He went back in and stood there, shivering a little as Keith came up and stepped off the grassy ledge into the water. 

Oh _shit_ —it was bitter cold, and seemed to nip all the blood out of his toes. He shivered out a shuttering breath, looking back at where the others were watching from the bridge. Pidge yelled, “You guys are in- _sane!_ ” 

“ _You’re_ the insane one!” Keith hollered back, slurred. “I’m cool!”

“Oh shit!” Ulaz shrieked, lunging farther into the water. The current kicked up around his knees, up his thighs, and began to soak through his shorts. “There’s fish! Get over here, Keith, lemme show you something—”

Just as he said it, and just as Keith started to walk over, Ulaz shouted out, hands darting into the water. Keith yelped, staggering back and nearly tripping when he hauled out a squirming, wriggling fish from the water. The water was roaring and bubbling around them, and he could hear the wet slap of the fish’s tail swinging back and forth.

Ulaz laughed loudly, holding up his prize to the rest of them on shore. Lance was hollering about how he got it all on video from where he stood on the river’s edge.

Keith lumbered up to see, feet going high in and out of the water. It felt so— _weird_. Why were his feet in this odd, elemental liquid anyways? It was so piercing as well. His feet were nonexistent. How was he standing? Did he even have feet? 

He tripped forward, hands going onto the grassy edge. Lance ducked down next to him, holding out the camera up. “I wanna see the video,” Keith begged.

“Aw, but you’re so cute,” Lance cooed. Keith scoffed, waving his hand in front of the camera to block it. “Okay, fine, and— _eek!_ Get the fish _away!_ ” Lance cried out, scrambling back when Ulaz came over, still holding the fish in his hand.

“What? He’s cool. Look at ‘im,” Ulaz said, holding it out to Lance. It’s big, beady eyes were on them both at the same time. 

Lance raced away, yelling, “Ew, ew, _ew!_ ” all along the way. Ulaz was gently petting the side of the fish that wouldn’t scrape the skin off his fingers, and offered to let Keith hold it. He shook his head, waving his hands for Ulaz to put the fish back, dammit.

“Do you always catch fish? You’re really good at it,” Keith said, and gasped a little when the fish _plunk_ ed back into the water. A dollop of water shot up after it, catching Keith by the chin when he leaned down to see it, and its shimmery tail swim away. 

The tang of whiskey and cherries came back to him as he started talking, “Yeah. I grew up by a river—I mean, it was polluted and we couldn’t drink the water, but in some areas there were fish. We’d take day-long trips to those areas and catch minos with our hands.”

“That’s incredible. Can you catch another for me?” Keith asked, crouching down with his hands on his knees. Ulaz set to work looking for another fish while Keith played with the water, spiraling his fingers back and forth over the ripples.

It took another five minutes before some fish showed up, and Ulaz meticulously stood over the school of them, his arms outstretched and hands in focus. Keith watched, wide-eyed, as Ulaz darted out for one, and cursed the water when he missed. 

They tried catching another fish, but Shiro called out to them to say that they needed to head out if they planned on making it across Idaho today. Keith shouted back, “Idaho?! No— _U_ daho!”

“I’m going to punch you!” Pidge yelled out.

Keith dissolved into giggles and nearly slipped into the water, but Ulaz caught him by the arm and _boy_ , talk about a way to get your heart going. Keith’s face went red as Ulaz steadied him and helped him out of the water. It took a while for Keith to realize his hair felt wet and—at what point did he go under water? His shirt was soaked through, and he didn’t realize it until he got to the car and Lance scolded him and ordered him to put on a dry shirt. Halfway through hanging his shirt up to dry on the passenger’s seat, Lance scolded him again and ordered that he just “put on my jacket—it doesn’t matter. I don’t need it.”

“Really?” Keith said, doe-eyed and easily causing Lance’s cheeks to flush pink. 

Lance bunched his shoulders up to his ears and said, “Yeah, you idiot! Just put it on so we can get going!”

Ulaz was sitting on the floor of the car, shaking out his wet shorts and tearing his shirt off because catching fish meant getting drenched. Keith stared at him openly, trying to figure out where this guy came from and why he looked and smelled so good. It took a minute for Keith to realize that Ulaz was smiling at him, and then Lance was between them forcefully helping Keith with the rest of the jacket.

“Zip up! It’s chilly up here—stop standing around get in the car,” Lance blurted out, twisting Keith around and practically shoving him into the passenger’s seat. Keith’s feet felt grimy, and it probably had something to do with the gravel and dirt sticking to the bottoms of his feet. He absently brushed them off as all the doors in the SUV closed, and Keith looked at Lance. 

Lance was red in the face and cleared his throat before jamming on the radio and pressing the SEEK button. They listened to snippets of talk shows, country music, old pop, until settling on an indie rock station. It was relatively quiet as Ulaz dug out a new shirt, all rolled up to provide proper space for everything else in his travel backpack, and pulled it on over his head. It was a tank top, and exposed the tattoo on his bicep that coupled the one on his forearm.

“The water was cold,” Keith commented quietly. It felt like no one was supposed to talk, and his voice seemed so much louder than the air conditioning, or the song on the radio.

“It’s still just spring. All the snow in the mountains are melting,” Ulaz explained. “It’s nice though, huh?”

 _Yeah…_ Keith couldn’t be sure if he said that out loud, or just in his head. “I’m kinda tired now. Wake me up when we get there?”

“Seriously? That’s, like, six hours from now,” Lance said, but Keith was already settling in. He pulled his knees up and let them fall against the door, and he tucked his head against the headrest. He closed his eyes and his already sluggish brain began to ease… and disperse.

  


  


Keith woke up to one of the windows opening, and felt the breeze tugging at his hair and the hood of Lance’s sweatshirt-jacket-combo. He reached a hand up and scrubbed at his eyes, groaning a little. He squinted out the window, and then over at where Lance was driving. The sound of people talking came to his ears, along with the mix of fruity flavors, and a hint of a motor shop somewhere in there. 

“—What a coincidence! I’m surprised you’ve never spent much time in San Diego when you lived in California,” Ulaz was saying. “I wish I could have gone to school there, but their schools didn’t compare to Stanford in terms of my major.”

“So you went into school knowing exactly what you were going to do?” Shiro asked.

“What a concept,” Hunk murmured from the back seat. “Isn’t Stanford expensive?”

“Yeah, and my parents helped out a lot. I mean, it’ll take a while to pay off my debt, but I think it was worth it. And the Greek life there was _great_. I rushed my freshmen year and got into Kappa Sigma, and—”

“Holy shit!” Lance shrieked, and if that didn’t wake Keith up, nothing did. His eyes went wide, looking at Lance, and then to the back where Hunk looked completely blown away. 

“Wait—you’re in Kappa Sigma?” Hunk asked, startled. “Because Lance and I are both in Kappa—and I live at the house at the U of M.”

“No kidding!” Ulaz said, and threw his head back laughing. He clapped his hands together and said, “I can’t _believe_ it! This is such a coincidence—so how long have you been in?”

“Two years now,” Hunk said. “That’s _insane_ —! I mean, what are the chances? What’s Kappa Sigma like at Stanford?”

Keith didn’t feel sluggish anymore—far from it. Hearing Ulaz say something so casually, like the fact that he was in _Kappa Sigma_ , AKA the reason Keith ever met Lance and Hunk in the first place, seriously convinced him that some divine work was at hand. Sure, there were Kappa Sigma chapters all over the United States, but just randomly coming across a hitchhiker like this, the day his internship ended, and looking like an angel sent down from _God_ —? It was all just too good to be true.

“ _Shit_ , I wish I could show you guys the place in person because it’s _beautiful_. I could never afford to live there, but I spent all my time there. I have so many pictures—my ma was obsessed with it and took all of them the day I gave her the tour around the house. Here—” Ulaz and Hunk were so thrilled about this, and Keith could tell Lance was starting to regret driving because he wanted to see the pictures. 

Ulaz pulled out his laptop from his travel backpack and propped it up. “It’s on The Row, and there’s, like, fifty guys there and it’s _insane_. It’s not the classiest frat, but all the guys are _awesome_. I was actually the vice president of the frat my senior year.”

 _I wouldn’t doubt it_ , Keith thought to himself as he realized that Ulaz had the personality, the looks, and the social flare that most presidents of frats were meant to have. 

“I wish we could visit your frat,” Hunk whined, pouting a little. “Your’s puts our house to shame.”

“It’s not that bad,” Shiro said.

“I dunno…” Pidge drawled, which caused Hunk to gasp, slapping a hand to his heart. 

“If ya ever find yourself by San Fran, give me a call. I could get you guys into a party or something,” Ulaz said, still skimming through all the pictures. They were barely done with the first floor. “I won’t show you guys the fourth floor. It’s a wreck—a lot of the newbies live up there and we need to renovate it. That was on our check list when I graduated. I think they have the money for it now.”

“So cool—!” Hunk gawked, in complete awe. “Could we go to San Fran after this?”

“I don’t know if my back could handle that…” Pidge confessed, wincing as she rubbed at her lower spine.

“Or my paycheck. I only have off for two weeks,” Shiro said.

“You’ve barely checked off the first week—we’ll be in Portland by tomorrow,” Keith said. “And it would just take us two or three days to get to San Fran, and five, six days back to Minnesota. We could stop by our friends’ places on Oakland.”

“Oh my God, are we seriously going to do this?” Lance gawked from the driver’s seat, looking at Keith expectantly. Keith shrugged, and Hunk begged for them to go to Kappa Sigma. 

“We’ll think about it,” Shiro said, uneasy nonetheless. “I mean, it’d be a tight fit into our schedule.”

“Unless we drive through the night tonight, shave off another day of travel,” Ulaz suggested, and just one look from him completely silenced Shiro from arguing. “I’m an excellent night driver, but this is your car and I don’t want you to feel anxious about me driving through the night. I can run for six hours on a cup of coffee. I’ve done it multiple times in college.”

“I don’t want to make you do that—” Shiro started, wincing a little. “I could drive.”

“You’ve been driving too much, though,” Keith argued. “Ulaz and I could switch off. Again, perfect score on my driver’s test.”

Shiro seemed hesitant about it all. It was a bit selfish of them to want to take away from Shiro’s limited vacation time, but Keith tried to rationalize it. It wasn’t like they took many vacations to begin with. The chances of Shiro having to go somewhere other than Minneapolis would be slim to none as far as Keith knew.

Eventually, Shiro said, “I’m fine with you two driving tonight. We’ll stop by a coffee shop at around nine.”

“Okay, perfect,” Keith agreed, reaching over to bump fists with his brother. 

Ulaz did the same out of obligation, and said, “Just in case you change your mind about not wanting to go to San Fran. I don’t want to pressure you into anything.”

Keith looked over at Lance, who made a face that said, “I wonder what _they’re_ talking about!” He stifled a laugh behind his hand, and grinned at his side mirror. If anything, Shiro would just agree to it so he could spend more time with Ulaz.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I keep doing this to myself. I keep writing 8 page chapters and I don't know why.


	19. Waterfalls

They stopped just beyond the border of Idaho and Washington, mostly for Lance and Hunk to geek over the fact that they went all the way from Minnesota to Oregon in a matter of days. They even stopped at the OREGON WELCOMES YOU sign, and Lance went so far as to climb on top of it for a picture. 

Hunk hoisted him up by lifting his feet, and them he rolled up onto the top, straddling the sign, shouting, “ _Nothing_ scares me! Not even heights! I’m already _dead anyway!_ ” He yelled it at the top of his lungs, hands cupped over his mouth. From the side, Keith heard Ulaz mutter, “Sweet Jesus,” under his breath. 

Shiro laughed and replied, “You get used to it.”

Keith broke out his cowboy hat even though it wasn’t even all that sunny out now. It was nearing eight thirty at this point, which led to a pink-painted sunset topped with oranges and yellows. Hunk took over driving for a while, now that they were out of the mountainous terrane for the time being. They stopped at all the waterfalls they could, though, along the way. There weren’t many, so each one was special and required rock-climbing to get the full effect of the mist on their faces.

He wore the hat for as long as he could before it became annoying having to tip it forward and back just to lean his head against the head rest. So he perched it over Bean’s head on the dash, and earned a smirk from Ulaz. 

Everyone was up for the moment, reading, on their phones (Keith gave Lance his phone for “no more than twenty minutes at a time”), or listening to their own music. Keith had his phone plugged in and was playing music quietly from the front, because he knew Shiro couldn’t concentrate with music on. He glanced over his shoulder at where Shiro lounged on the far back seat, reading a fantasy book of some kind. Pidge was beside him, leaning against his shoulder with her back against him, reading the second book in a sci-fi series. She finished the first one nearly two days ago.

“So you’re a synesthete,” Ulaz commented, and Keith shrugged. “You know, I had a friend in college who was a synesthete. She was like Sherlock, with her own little… mind palace.”

“Yeah, sometimes I wish I had that one,” he confessed with a scoff. “Lexical- _gustatory_ synesthesia. It sounds disgusting and smells disgusting.”

“Do all words have a smell?”

“Only some. Mostly names, which is why I associate people with smells,” he explained. “It sometimes helps because words my brain pegs as important—like terms in a textbook—get smells on occasion.” 

“Hm. Do you mind if I ask what ‘Ulaz’ smells like? I can’t imagine you hear that name too often.” Being asked that caused Keith’s nose to wrinkle up a little. It was like when Pidge asked him that day they sat together on Shiro’s couch, trying to come to terms with the fact that Lance wasn’t going anywhere, even if he _was_ dead. “You don’t have to answer that if you don’t want to.”

But Ulaz asked kindly enough to convince Keith to go along with it. It wasn’t like he took much time in his days to explain what sort of smell people were giving off.

“You smell like a whiskey old fashioned with maraschino cherries,” he said, and Ulaz chuckled a little. “What?”

“That’s funny. Because when my parents first came to America, that was the first drink my pa tried. He _loves_ them now. Every Friday at his favorite restaurant—orders a whiskey old fashioned because that’s where they recommended it to him,” he explained. “And when I was younger, I’d _beg_ for them to put cherries in it because he’d let me eat the cherries. I didn’t like the whiskey so much, so I’d lick all that off first and then eat the cherry.”

“You think it’s a coincidence?” Keith asked, and Ulaz shrugged, smiling a little.

“Maybe. Or maybe I subconsciously linked that scent with you. Maybe we all have channels that we reach out to people, and you just pick up the smells from them. It’s like… the idea that even when sleeping, people can tell when another person is looking at them. Are you following my train of thought?”

“Kinda, yeah,” he said, studying Ulaz’s profile as he talked. “Are you and your dad close?”

“Oh yeah. But I’m closer with my ma if anything,” he confessed, pursing his lips for a moment and tilting his head to the side. “What about you? Mama’s boy or what?”

Keith snorted a little, shaking his head. “Neither. It’s just really been Shiro and I. We were foster kids, and when he turned eighteen we had already moved to Minnesota so he could start school there with reciprocity.”

“Really? I never would have guess—I mean, that’s not to say I _could_ have guessed. I don’t want to fit labels on people—”

“It’s fine,” he laughed, smiling softly as he pulled his knees up. “I don’t mind it. I got to travel around a lot because of it, surprisingly. I was a bit of a… troublemaker before college. I shaped up when we moved to Minnesota, though. And _that’s_ not to say I’m not still a troublemaker—so don’t get on my bad side. I know how to prank people.”

Ulaz laughed, and spared a moment to glance back—probably at Shiro—before glimpsing at Keith. “What’d you use to do? In high school?”

Keith snickered a little, and cracked his knuckles before starting the stories of all the high schools he went to, middle schools, elementary schools. It took until middle school for him to realize that he didn’t need to care about what people thought because he was just going to move again, so he used that to his advantage. The shit he started wasn’t amateur level stuff—food fights, that kind of shit. He once caught a squirrel and unleashed it in the library computer lab. At one point he rigged a cord through the hole in everyone’s lockers down one of the hallways, so the principle had to get one of the tech ed teachers to come out and snip it with bolt cutters. 

With his knack for technology, he hacked into one of his school’s grading programs and swapped grades around. He never got caught for that—at least not the first time—because he was meticulous with it. Inching grades up little by little on a hardly noticeable spectrum. That time he was a little more chaotic good, considering he used it to help students he overheard crying to their teachers in high school for refusing to bump up their A- to just an A. 

“I went on strike in one of my english classes because the teacher accused me of cheating when the other girl copied _my_ work down. She believed that bitch over _me_ and so I stopped turning shit in that didn’t matter. Like drafts and stuff. I mean, I got A’s on everything I turned in, and I got a four on the AP exam, but my teacher was _pissed_ that I was even able to pass at all,” Keith explained. “She was all ‘You’re such a great writer! Why didn’t you put more work into it?’ But honestly, I just took AP English to get that credit taken care of for college.”

“How many credits did you come in with?”

“I dunno. Something like twenty. I didn’t go ham like some of the other kids in dorm did. I had a friend who came in with sophomore status because she passed so many AP courses in high school,” he confessed, arms folded over his chest. “I sort of wish I’d have done that. But a few of my AP classes got screwed up because I moved after the second quarter and had to pick it up at a different school with a different curriculum. So that kinda sucks.”

“Did you know you were going to go to the U of M?” Ulaz asked, and Keith shook his head.

“I thought I was going to go to Madison.”

“ _Boo!_ ” Pidge called out from the back seat.

Keith glared back at her, only to be met with the fury of the three other people in the car. “I’m still disappointed in you, Keith,” Shiro said, and that would have affected Keith, had he not heard Shiro say that every other time Keith mentioned that he initially wanted to go to the University of Wisconsin Madison.

“This is why we aren’t dating,” Lance said, and Keith laughed, pressing his forehead into the shoulder of his chair before recovering to reach his fist out to Lance. 

They bumped fists and Keith said, “That was a good one.”

“I thought so,” he laughed, and returned back to the phone in his hand. “Did you know the United States has become approximately five percent worse since I died?” 

“We are all unfortunately aware of this, yes,” Hunk said. “I’d almost say seven percent.”

“Every day we lose another percent,” Pidge said blandly from the back seat. She casually flipped the page in her book before making eye contact with Keith. “There is _nothing_ funny about losing a percent in this case.”

“I have a question for you,” Ulaz said to Keith. “So, if you aren’t a part of Kappa Sigma, how’d you meet Lance and Hunk?”

“I was at their party. I met Lance and we hung out and then decided to be roommates,” he said. “What are the parties like? At Stanford Kappa Sigma?” 

“Well… we were sorta known as the heavy drinkers. Our parties were sorta a drunken mess, ya know? Some frats are like that. But I mean, the guys were really nice, and we only ever had the cops visit a handful of times during my years there. So nothing _too_ crazy… I don’t think.

“But I could never drink like I did back then. I was a _mess_ my freshmen year. No—I actually quit drinking after college,” he explained. 

“Seriously?” Keith gawked. “Wow. Imagine that.”

“Keith…” Shiro scolded from the back seat. Ulaz chuckled, smirking at Keith, who smirked right back.

They chatted for a while about random stories Ulaz remembered, and random stories Keith brought up. It passed the time, at least until nine—the time they were waiting for. They Googled coffee shops in the area and picked a cute one on the verge of closing. They had another half hour to get there and get out. So Ulaz sped into the parking lot after taking the highway exit, and parked the car. 

The others were out-cold, considering all the exercise they had these past few days, and not to mention all the time spent outdoors. Keith rifled around in his backpack for money before hopping out of the passenger’s seat and slamming the door behind him. “I’m glad we didn’t have to stop at Starbucks,” Ulaz confessed. “I can’t stand corporate coffee.”

“I dunno. I don’t usually _get_ coffee at Starbucks,” Keith confessed as he held the door open for Ulaz. He wondered what they looked like, cruising into a coffee shop parking lot thirty minutes to closing time, in an SUV full of people, and probably looking like a mess from being in the car all day on the side of climbing waterfalls.

It was a rustic coffee shop, much larger than the one below his apartment where Nyma worked. The tables were fashioned with corks underneath a glass surface, and there was a worker going around wiping them all down. Their menu was made of chalkboards and perfectly scripted, handwritten fonts. Keith squinted at them before looking at Ulaz, and then stepping up to order. Just a regular coffee with a shot of vanilla.

The drive was long and rather eerie considering the fog that swept in later that night, and how the dark enveloped the road in front of them. There were cars along the way, of course, but other than that it was just dark… country roads. They swapped places a little over two hours later, and Keith didn’t mind the silent, calmness of it. They didn’t have the radio playing, so all they could hear was the gentle hum of the tires spinning, and the bump of cracks on the road.

Keith quietly asked Ulaz to pull out the bag of grapes, and soon they had it propped up on the console between them. The plastic was illuminated by the watery blue filtering around the interior of the car, and Keith caught Ulaz staring at the ceiling again, and around the car. 

It was late, and everyone else was asleep in their reclined chairs, or on the floor where Pidge was nestled. Keith could see the glow in his rearview mirror, from where Lance was, but not quite visible. “I have a question,” Keith whispered to Ulaz.

“Shoot.”

“What did Lance show you? When he said he could prove that he wasn’t alive?”

“Ya know—that he can’t bleed and stuff. It’s kind of hard to _not_ believe after seeing that,” he confessed, and Keith’s eyebrows twisted together. Ulaz seemed to see the change in his expression, because he said a moment later, “Oh—I just assumed… I mean, I figured he showed you that already.”

“No, he didn’t.” Keith tried not to sound bitter about it, and he hoped his poker face was coming in handy this time around. “What did he do? If you don’t mind me asking?”

Ulaz hesitated for a moment, glancing back at the others. Everyone was passed out. “I feel like Lance should tell you. Are you… You know he used to cut himself?”

 _I had suspicions_ , Keith thought to himself, thinking about everything he reconsidered about Lance these past few weeks. “Yeah, why?” 

“Well, he has a razor stashed in his jacket—which, in retrospect, is kind of dangerous if you happened to go to the airport. There’s one of those hidden mini pockets behind the label. You know, the type of thing you usually find on the back of your athletic pants and you never know what to put in there because it’s so small. Anyway, when he cut his wrist—and he cut _deep_. I don’t think he feels pain. The skin just sort of, split. And you could see all the blood and muscles and stuff, sitting there like it was contained in glass. And then it resealed. I thought I was going to pass out.”

Keith looked at him, where Ulaz shuttered a little. He looked back at the road, frowning a little. _At what point did Lance realize he couldn’t bleed?_

They were relatively quiet for the rest of the trip. They switched once more, an hour before reaching the minimal city traffic. There was hardly anyone on the roads at that time of night, so they pulled in to a truck stop for the night, and also for a piss because they chugged their coffees and drank so much water since then. 

It was a one-person bathroom, so Keith got back to the SUV first and found Lance sitting up in the bucket seat, asking, “Where’d you guys go?” in that quiet whisper.

“Bathroom,” Keith answered, nestling down into the driver’s seat. “Go to sleep—it’s, like, one in the morning.”

He knew Lance was pouting at him, so he looked up a little from around the edge of his jacket hood. Lance narrowed his eyes at Keith again before turning away and reclining back into his chair. Keith rolled his eyes and said, “What? What are you so salty about?”

“Me? I’m salty about nothing.”

Keith hummed something under his breath and looked away. He settled in to sleep, only to be interrupted by Lance saying, “Okay, I’m a little salty.” Keith groaned a little, turning back to look at Lance again. “You keep flirting with Ulaz.”

“I do _not_ ,” Keith countered quietly. “My brother totally has dibs.”

“No one has dibs…” Shiro muttered, and neither of them could be sure if it was in his sleep or not. Either way, Keith was officially freaked out, and Lance looked just as scared. Shiro shifted so his back was to them, and he was tucked against the backrest.

After a moment of silence, Lance said, “All I’m saying is that it’s getting on my nerves. I’m gonna go to sleep now.”

“Whoa, whoa—hang on. First off: I’m not into Ulaz. Second: Who do I hold hands with more frequently?”

It wasn’t that hard of a question, but Lance was moping and took his merry time answering. “ _Me_ , I guess,” he muttered, kicking his leg out a little as he throw his arms down. “But you don’t have to hold hands with people to flirt with them.”

Normally Keith would have rolled his eyes because that sounded a whole lot like something Lance once said. If Keith thought hard enough about it, he’d peg it back to a time Keith almost left Kappa Sigma with a guy who lived in the neighborhood over. He said Keith led the guy on, saying that they could hang out another time since Keith was so tired that night—he didn’t stay up with an after-party in mind. That night Lance also slept in his own bed, but those details Keith couldn’t really remember quite clearly.

He could see Ulaz coming back from the restroom, and promptly opened up the driver’s door. He stepped out and walked around the hood of the car and came to Lance’s door. He pulled it open and leaned over, hands against the armrest. “I am _this close_ to flicking you in the head,” Keith said to Lance, close enough so their foreheads touched. 

“Do it. I dare you.” Lance challenged, narrowing his eyes at Keith. Ulaz hopped into the passenger’s seat and dug around in his backpack for whatever-the-fuck.

Keith reached up fast and flicked Lance on the side of the head. He yelped, and whined, but was silenced by Keith quickly kissing his complaints away. After a moment, he pulled away, trying hard to ignore the obviousness of the sound of their lips separating. Keith rose his eyebrows at Lance, as if challenging him to argue against him again. He was just wide-eyed, and probably significantly more awake than he should have been.

“Go to sleep,” Keith ordered before stepping back and slamming the door behind him

  


  


“I dunno guys. Heights really freak me out,” Hunk confessed. They were just north of Portland now, checking out its greatest destination—in Keith’s own personal opinion. There was something so… _majestic_ about waterfalls that made them so awe-inspiring. This one happened to have a bridge up several dozen feet over the drop, and a switchback trail leading up to it. One look at it, and Hunk was practically trembling in his boots. 

“You don’t have to come if you don't want to,” Pidge said. “But I mean, your loss, not mine.”

“You guys could just take lots of pictures! I’ll be fine down here,” he said, and started shaking his head when Lance insisted he come with. “You guys go ahead. It looks like the path up there leads to the gift shop, so I could drive the car there and wait for you guys.”

“That _is_ where the main attraction is,” Ulaz said. “This is just the small waterfall.”

“But we _gotta—_!” Pidge cried out. “I mean, look at that _bridge_!”

“We could… split up?” Lance suggested, stepping up beside Hunk with a hand on his hip. “Yeah, I mean, Hunk and I could spend more time at Malt Shake Falls or whatever and you guys go up there and hang out.”

“I think you mean Multnomah Falls,” Keith deadpanned. Lance stuck his tongue out at him. 

Shiro sighed and offered a shrug. “I mean, sure. I’m fine with that. It’ll probably take us a while to get up there anyways, so if you guys get bored or anything…”

“We could just start the trek towards you guys if that happens. Sounds good to me,” Hunk said. “But first, I gotta pee. Where’s there a bathroom?”

They were at the base of the waterfall, and with the map right there, they tracked down the campsite directly across the parking lot from them. After looking both ways, they made a run for it across the road leading to the gift shop and the main park attraction. At the edge of the parking lot, there was a slight drop accompanied by a stone ledge, and stone stairs leading down to the park and the campsite. 

“Hey Keith,” Lance said, jogging up to him as they crossed the road. “Do you think—I mean, can I talk to you?” he asked, and Keith shrugged.

“Yeah, sure.”

“Cool. It looks like there’s a river over there—mind if we go that way?” he asked, and Keith went along with it, following him down the stone steps to the park. 

Pidge confessed that she needed to piss as well, so Shiro waved them off and Keith heard him say to them, “Ulaz and I will be over by the car waiting.”

Keith glanced over at his brother as Lance started to walk towards the park that was down by the riverside. There were pine trees scattered everywhere, and there was a public restroom by the campsite where Pidge and Hunk raced to. Ulaz and Shiro found themselves perched on the stone ledge by the parking lot, near the curve of the steps leading down to the park, and where their SUV was.

They got a decent distance away, as far east the water’s edge where Lance pushed his hands over his face and groaned. “I’m so worried I’m gonna disappear when I see my parents,” he confessed, voice quiet and hoarse. “A-And I _know_ I shouldn’t feel scared or regret anything because it’s all already done, but… I’m afraid of _dying_ again. It’s different this time. And I d-don’t want to… _leave_ you, Keith. I don’t want to leave.”

Keith stood with his boots coated in dew and eyes wide. It felt like so long ago that Keith witnessed Lance crying, and here he was again. This time around, he took it better. 

“That’s fair. I mean, I bet you didn’t expect to die twice,” Keith said, and Lance managed a hollow laugh, sniffling as he pulled his hands away from his face. “And it’s fine. I mean, we’ll _be_ with you when you die again. You won’t be alone.”

Lance laughed again, and it came out as a sob. “I know, but I-I regret it so much now. I wish I would have told you everything. And—And I don’t know if that would have _changed_ anything, and I know what I said about not wanting to depend on people… but I-I think I could have depended on you. I can see us _being_ together, like, permanently, and now it just hurts to think I can’t be that way with you anymore. Like, you’re gonna move on and I wish we could have been best friends for a long time and get _married_ or something. You know what I mean? And we’d, like, get one of those cool studio apartments in LA and you’d be a lawyer or something and I’d be trying to save the environment even though we all know it’s fucked and humans are the fucking worst and eventually we’ll all realize that we’ve been fighting for the wrong side. 

“And I would have given you the _coolest_ ring. I’m talkin’, like— _fuck_ —I dunno, probably a ring pop because you can eat it and it won’t go to waste,” Lance said, and Keith giggled, trying to push away the water forming on his lower eyelashes. He ended up just smearing it across his cheeks. “I mean, maybe I’m just insane. What do you think? Do you—Do you think we could have gotten married someday?”

Keith laughed again, aware that one of his hands was tangled in Lance’s, and it hurt to think that Lance wasn’t even there. He was just holding hands with an apparition that smelled like summer. “Yeah. I mean, I hate the idea of marriage but I wouldn’t say no. Not at this point, I don’t think.”

In the next moment, Lance’s arms went around him, and they were hugging on the riverbank feeling sick to their stomachs over this. Keith tucked his damp eyes against Lance’s shoulder, and tried to relax up until the point where Lance said, “And I’ve never been with another guy except you. And I guess it’s cool that I only ever slept with one guy in my entire life. Ya know?”

Keith’s response was a hoarse laugh against his chest, squeezing him tighter around the middle. “Yeah, it’s cool.”

“Like, I wasn’t a virgin or anything but you took my gay virginity,” he said, laughing a little. Keith shook his head, willing him to stop, but he didn’t. “You have my gay virginity forever and ever and I’m cool with that. You can keep it, I don’t need it anymore.”

“I’ll keep it safe.”

“And… And I really wanna talk to Hunk because I don’t know if I gave him that big bro-speech before I left for Appleton. I bet I did. I had a whole thing planned out, but I deleted it off of my computer.” Keith hummed against Lance, leaning back and forth and bringing Lance with him.

“Is it elaborate and eloquent?”

“You bet your sweet ass it is,” Lance laughed, nose stuffy. Keith giggled, reaching up to wipe some of the moisture from his eyes. He felt Lance tug on his hood, and slip his hand into the back of the jacket. 

“What are you doing?” Keith asked, voice muffled a little.

“Just getting rid of something we don’t need,” he replied, and there was the sound of Lance unzipping a pocket. Keith realized what he was going for, and a moment later Lance had it in his hand, and stepped back. He cranked his shoulder back, and threw as hard as he could. It took a few seconds, but eventually they saw something _pnk_ into the water. “There! Gone forever!” he hollered, throwing his arms up. 

Keith laughed as he walked over to Lance and hugged him around the torso. They swayed for a moment together, before Keith suggested they head back to the others. Hunk and Pidge were already chasing each other to the parking lot when they started walking back. Shiro stood up on the stone ledge and called out, “Hurry up! Or we’ll leave you behind, Keith!”

“We’re _coming!_ ” Keith hollered back, laughing as his arms swayed, and his hand became linked in Lance’s again. Lance smiled at him, and Keith smiled back. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Question: Do you think Lance is even going to disappear. Tell me your theories about what's gonna happen with Lance !! I WANNA HEAR THEM !!
> 
> Lemme give you a truth: I teared up a little when I wrote the scene about Lance rambling. And I was in a public setting by this outdoor patio, and there was this meeting going on in the room next to me. This guy came out and tried to go outside but it was locked, and he looks at me and is like, "Is it really gonna do this?" And I was like, "Who knows man." And he tried the door again and he's like, "The patio's right there. I can see it." And then we both saw the sign that read, "Patio closed for the winter." And I swear to God, no joke, he says in the most bitter voice I have ever heard, "It isn't even winter..." And I was like tearing up the whole time like, "I know man, I know" but really I was crying over the Klangst.


	20. Benson Bridge

“I feel so fucking high, my ears are popping,” Pidge sang, swinging her arms to and fro with a heave of air before saying, “But seriously, who else’s ears are popping?”

“Gum helps. Here—” Ulaz pulled out a pack of gum, just like that, and passed it to Pidge.

She accepted it and gasped, “ _Ooh!_ Bubble gum.” Ulaz responded by blowing a massive fucking bubble—Keith was convinced that it was the size of his cowboy hat—and sucked it back in. 

“Only the best,” he responded, and took the pack back before handing it over to Shiro. Shiro bit his in two and passed the other half to Keith, since one whole brick was a bit much for them.

They were probably halfway up the switchbacks when it shifted to semi-steep vertical climbs. The rocky walls on their right were coated in moss and vines, and if Keith stared at it long enough, he could convince himself that he was in a jungle. His thighs were starting to burn, as if his calves didn’t already feel like jello. He was just thankful they weren’t carrying much on them except for their phones.

They climbed past a family heading back down, and they would have just slipped right past them had Ulaz not started a conversation with them. The family had thick accents, and in a matter of a few sentences they were speaking in a completely different language. Pidge’s eyebrows shot up to her hairline as she looked at Keith, and then at Shiro whose ears had gone red. It wasn’t every day they stumbled across people casually speaking Hindi to strangers.

And then Ulaz was suddenly introducing them to the family. Keith was startled to hear his name brought up, and then Pidge’s, and then his brother’s. Keith shook hands with the father, who then shook Shiro and Pidge’s hands. 

“Did you all come from the main building?” Shiro asked.

“Yes, we did,” the mother said. “It’s a beautiful walk.”

“How far would you say? From the Benson Bridge?” Ulaz asked, and they gave an approximate time on it. Fifteen minute walk, max. They had small chat in which Pidge and Keith became bored and wandered off towards the bridge. They weren’t far from it now, and there were massive boulders on all sides of it, and a precarious dirt ledge that went around to the mist. 

Pidge jogged straight over there, throwing her arms high and yelling, “Take a picture!”

“Okay—hold still,” Keith said, laughing as he pulled out his phone from the pocket in Lance’s jacket. He could still feel his stone somewhere in there, the one Lance stole for him at Wall-Drug. 

He sauntered over to her, holding out the picture for her before he was roped into a picture of the two of them in front of the water fall, another of the bridge in the distance, the ravine below them. She leaned dangerously close to the ledge and took a picture going down before Ulaz and Shiro showed up. Shiro fussed over getting her away from the ledge, and Ulaz fake _aw!_ ed from the edge of the bridge. “You’re so sweet, acting all motherly,” he jested.

“It’s called being cautious and being threatened by Miss Holt,” Shiro corrected, pulling Pidge by her wrist no matter how much she whined about how careful she was being.

There was a ginormous rock beside the bridge entrance, and Ulaz eyed it up for a second before handing his phone over to Shiro. “Yeah, well, you don’t need to be a mother hen with me. Hang on to this—I’m gonna climb that boulder.”

“Please don’t,” Shiro said, almost half-heartedly since he knew he wouldn’t be changing Ulaz’s mind any time soon. Pidge whooped and hollered, “Hell yeah! Climb that boulder! Climb that boulder!” All Keith could think was, _Dear Lord, save him_.

Ulaz used the bridge railing—a stone structure with a flat cap on the top—to hoist himself up. He secured a foot on one of the edges of the rock before pushing off the bridge railing. His stance never faltered, even when Shiro came over to spot him. “Relax, I’ve got this,” Ulaz said, pushing himself up by his hands, biceps showing the veins and tendons piecing together the muscles of his arms. Keith could practically feel the tension in Shiro’s scent heighten, just seeing something so precarious as Ulaz climbing a boulder over the chasm of a ravine.

When Ulaz made it to the top, he stood on his feet and threw his arms into the air. Keith took a picture, and then a video of Ulaz yelling, “ _Woo! Fuck the patriarchy!_ ”

Pidge shouted out a laugh, leaning up and over the railing, screaming, “ _Fuck the patriarchy!_ ”

Shiro hissed at them, waving his arms, “Are you crazy?! That family can hear you!”

And suddenly, they heard something in the distance, “ _I can hear you guys!_ ” It was Hunk, and his voice came from farther north. Keith laughed, starting across the bridge where he could see where the path wound around the hill of the mountain. It was all dirt beyond the stone bridge, and Keith found Hunk meandering around the edge of it. 

“Hunk! You made it!” Keith laughed, throwing his arms up and giving Hunk a pat on the back once he was close enough.

“Yeah, some people said the path here wasn’t as steep so I came over real quick,” he said, and before Keith could ask it, he said, “Lance was distracted by the gift shop. We were gonna wait to see the other waterfall with you guys.”

“Distracted by the gift shop?” Keith repeated with a laugh. “Why’s that?”

“We all know Lance takes forever to shop. He’s probably gonna beg you to buy a shirt for him or something,” Pidge said, swaying back with her heels pressed into the stone ledge of the bridge. She hopped off, swinging around with her arms out. Her eyes went up to the sky where she gasped and pointed. “Are those rain clouds?”

Keith looked up, having to tip his cowboy hat up to see past the rim. “Shit, looks like it.” Almost as soon as he said it, a faint, barely noticeable drop of water _plink_ ed onto his cheek, narrowly missing his eye. He swiped it off and remembered that he was still feeling the after effects of crying. He sort of wished he had a water bottle right about now—he felt dehydrated.

Ulaz was still standing on the boulder, and Hunk didn’t notice him until Keith looked over there. “Oh shit, what’s he doing up there? How’d he get up there?” Hunk asked, squinting up at where Ulaz was taunting Shiro—or, more accurately, flirting with Shiro. They could all tell because he was quoting Shakespeare, and blatantly shouting over every attempt Shiro made to try and stop him. Eventually Shiro patted the side of the rock and looked over at them, looking completely helpless. Keith and Hunk shrugged.

When Ulaz finally slid down, he ended up jumping straight into Shiro on the last few feet, and sent them both staggering. He was laughing, but Shiro clearly was not. “C’mon, it was funny,” Ulaz said.

“It was dangerous,” Shiro remarked, and glanced over at the waterfall again, only to do a double take when he realized Pidge was back over by the waterfall, just asking to be electrocuted because the rain was starting to come down in a steady, faint mist. “ _Pidge!_ C’mon we gotta go!”

“Hang on!” she yelled back. Shiro looked like he wanted to go over there and grab her away from the ledge, firefighter style, but Ulaz slung his arm around Shiro’s shoulders and dragged him across the Benson Bridge. 

Keith tugged his cowboy hat off and showed it to Hunk. “You think this is waterproof?”

Hunk took a look at it and flipped it around and tried it on. “I dunno. It feels like it’s made out of felt or something. So probably not.”

“Shit. Then what’s it good for?” Keith asked, snatching the hat back and tucking it into his jacket. He zipped the jacket up around it. “Forty dollars for a hat that can’t even save me from the rain.”

“ _Forty dol—_ ” Hunk started shrieking, but was interrupted by his _actual_ shriek when thunder crashed overhead. They all looked up, and that was all it took for them to realize that it wasn’t thunder at all.

Pidge cried out, scrambling back from the shadow looming over the bridge. It took a split second for Shiro to lunge at Keith and Hunk, shoving them back off the bridge and sprawling out onto the damp dirt. The earth shook under them, and the sound of something crashing into the bridge deafened all their ears. It echoed against the cliff, and a split second later a spray of hard, cold water shot over them. It bit into Keith’s legs as he scrambled up, head ducked until whatever it was rocked the ground hundreds of feet below them.

His brother’s arm was still around him, holding him tight around his middle as they sat up. Hunk rolled over and heaved himself up, gasping at the sight. Keith turned around, jaw dropping—

—The bridge was split in two.

Raw wires stuck out from the concrete, and strips of metal barely hung together between the two halves. They saw Pidge, shielded by the boulder next to the bridge, getting up to her knees and then her feet with a cough. Ulaz got up beside the edge of the bridge, standing beside Shiro as they all got up and realized that they were _so close_ to being killed by a boulder the size of a bus.

Keith felt his legs stinging as he stood up, and he looked down to find them covered in blood. Shiro’s legs were slightly better, but the bits of rocks and pebbles mixed in with the water cut up his ankles. Hunk looked like he faired the best.

“Keith—your legs—” Shiro started.

“I’m fine. Pidge, are you okay?” Keith asked, stepping over to the bridge. His brother held him back instantly, holding him tightly by the arm.

“We shouldn’t go on the bridge—it’s not stable anymore,” Ulaz said. 

Pidge stared at them from across the concrete, a bit of red streaking down her arm from where a flying rock must have hit her. “But— _guys_ ,” she said, voice shaking. “I can—I can make the jump if someone’s there to spot me.” 

“No, Pidge, we’ll meet you at the bottom—” Shiro started, but Hunk was already racing forward. “ _Hunk!_ Jesus fucking Christ.”

Hunk stepped onto the bridge and hurried to the ledge. Keith saw him look down the gap between them, and at all the frayed wires that used to hold the concrete together. He slowly stepped back from it and held his arms out. “C’mon, Pidge, I’ll catch you if you fall,” he promised.

“Y-You better not drop me,” she said, voice clipped as she stepped close to the ledge and looked down. Honestly, the jump wasn’t that huge as far as Keith could tell, but with the distance it would take to fall to the bottom of the ravine… any gap like that would be a giant fucking chasm. Pidge stepped back from the ledge, and made a running leap across. 

It would have been completely anticlimactic, had the rain not been pouring down, and a massive bolt of lighting plunged the entire bridge into a bright white light. Pidge was screaming, slamming straight into Hunk’s chest and slapping her arms around him. He grabbed onto her, holding her tightly, and practically carrying her off the bridge. It sounded like she was sobbing into his shirt, but once he got close enough, she pulled away and was laughing. The rain looked like tears down her cheeks.

“I-I can’t b-believe Lance _missed this!_ ” she cried out, squeezing onto Hunk again and yelling, “ _Thank you my dear friend!_ ”

Hunk laughed, or at least Keith thought he was laughing until it came out in sobs. Keith was startled a little, but realized that a lot of the time, laughter sounded like crying. He shouldn’t have been that surprised when Hunk cried, “That was the scariest thing that’s ever happened to me!”

Pidge howled with laughter, letting him hang on to her as a sudden clash of thunder. It was drowned out by the sound of ambulance sirens howling in the distance. Keith looked at Shiro, wide-eyed, who looked between all of them before saying, “Shit, we should get out of here.”

“Agreed,” Keith said, feeling his brother tug on his arm and lead him away from the Benson Bridge, scattered with chunks of rock and concrete. They all ran for five minutes straight downhill, their legs on fire—Keith and Shiro more so than the others. He started to feel the burn of his cuts and bruises from the spray of water and pebbles, and found a few marks on his arm where the surface-level scrapes were. Pidge’s arm stopped bleeding somewhere along the way, and the rain washed the red stains off. The canopy over their heads caused the rain to fall in massive droplets that Lance’s sweatshirt blocked from soaking his cowboy hat.

Keith’s legs looked better after the rain soaked all the blood into his socks (which wasn’t all that much better), and as they slowed to the exit of the forest path, Keith ducked down to check the cuts. Only two of them were still bleeding, and dragging a stream of pinkish red down his legs, and drying on his leg hairs.

“Are your legs okay?” Ulaz asked, and it took a second for Keith to realize he was talking to Shiro.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Keith?”

“Just a scratch,” he replied, looking over to Pidge. She was checking her arm, and held it up close to her face. She stuck her tongue out at it and tasted the blood before cringing and pulling it away. “Are you okay?”

“Oh, yeah, I’m fine. I dunno why it’s bleeding so much,” she confessed, and Ulaz told her to come closer so he could check it. Evidently working as a park ranger required that he know first aid. They meandered over to the gift shop where they stood under the shelter of the roof that jutted out above them. Heavy streams of water cascaded down from it, creating pools in the dirt and grass, and splashing up their legs. 

Ulaz dug around in Shiro’s backpack for a water bottle, and used it to clean off her arm. He scrubbed a thumb over the wound, and when he asked if that hurt, she was busy biting down on her lip to answer. She shook her head, though. 

“I have gauze in my backpack, if you want me to wrap it up,” Ulaz said, and instantly Pidge stopped tearing her lip apart with her teeth. She looked as if she had just been blessed by God as she squeaked out, “Mmhm,” and followed his lead as he asked Hunk where he parked the SUV.

While they headed over there, a firetruck showed up, horn blaring. Shiro and Keith watched from the safety of the building’s awning. Keith was certain most of the noise was coming from the rain, but he realized that it was actually probably the main attraction of the park: the massive fucking waterfall down the path from the gift shop.

“We should probably go find Lance,” Keith said, arms still folded over his stomach where his cowboy hat was tucked away.

“Sure,” Shiro said, and turned to look in the direction of the SUV. He shouted out to the others, “We’ll be inside! Come find us when you’re done!”

“Okay!” Hunk shouted, waving to them. Keith waved back before disappearing through the glass doors.

It felt weird being in such a dry climate after standing out in the rain for so long. Lance’s sweatshirt sleeves clung to his arms in the worst way, so he shook it off and held the cowboy hat off to his side, letting it swing and dry out as they walked around the gift shop together.

There was another rock kiosk that Keith moseyed over to. He dug his hand through the rocks and debated pulling an Allura, but on second though, _Nah_. He put the rock back and glanced at his brother who gave him a proud smile. Keith rolled his eyes.

The gift store was huge considering the small size of the park, so they couldn’t find Lance straight away. Keith figured he was probably trying shit on anyway—they took long enough as it was. He wouldn’t be surprised if Lance went ahead to the waterfall without them. Chlorine softly drifted through the back of his mind, lingering like always as he sifted through the clothing racks, thinking every now and then, “This looks like something Lance would wear.”

And then Pidge bounded in, practically slamming straight into Keith’s side. “So did you find Lance? I think it’s just gonna keep raining, so Ulaz suggested we skip the other waterfall.”

“You won’t really be able to see it with this rain,” Ulaz said, whiskey voice appearing behind Keith. 

“Sure, I don’t mind skipping it,” Keith said. “And nah, I think he’s in the dressing room.”

“Well he better fucking hurry up,” she muttered, and marched over to the back of the store were the changing rooms were. Ulaz shrugged at Keith, and then wandered over to the cashier’s counter and sifted through the National Park patches. Keith searched for Shiro, and found his head among the clothes, his hands holding up a sweatshirt. He must have sensed Keith’s eyes on him, because he looked over and held the sweatshirt up. It was a picture of a pine tree. 

“Hey guys,” Pidge said, weaving through the clothing racks to come over to where Hunk was inspecting the sweatshirt Shiro was then trying on. “Lance isn’t in any of the dressing rooms. I checked the bathrooms too.”

Keith’s attention spiked, and he hurried over to them as Hunk asked, “Are you sure?”

“Positive. I weaseled under some of the dressing room stall doors, too. He’s not there.”

All of them were silent for a split second, each of them jumping to the same conclusion that led Keith to run and check for himself. He weaved between the clothing racks and bursting into the nook within the store that held the restrooms and the dressing rooms. He checked under each stall door, heart racing faster with each one. 

“Keith—he’s not there. He probably went to check out the waterfall—” Pidge said, and was interrupted by Keith saying, “Then let’s go there. C’mon.”

He rushed past her, running for the door. He should have left his phone with Lance. They wouldn’t be freaking out like this— _Keith_ wouldn’t be freaking out like this. His panic hitched when he looked over at the waterfall in the distance, where the rain obscured the railing blocking the viewers from the attraction. He hurriedly folded his cowboy hat up in Lance’s jacket and started running.

“ _Keith!_ Wait up!” Shiro shouted, and he could hear his brother’s footsteps rising faster, chasing after Keith. There were sirens in the distance, where the firetrucks and ambulances were collecting far down the road. 

He wasn’t even at the railing yet, but he could tell no one was there. No one was there, not with the rain being like it was. There was just rain and waterfall mist, and not a speck of Lance among it. But Keith could still smell the chlorine, just thinking about Lance and where he could have gone—

“Keith—” Shiro’s voice started behind him. Keith stared at the waterfall, and the stream of white water falling from the cliffs. There were massive walls of mossy rocks surrounding them in this ravine, and Keith felt so small. His chest heaved, shoulders shaking. “Keith, we shouldn’t be out in the rain like this. Come on,” Shiro said, tugging his hand onto Keith’s arm.

Keith yanked away from him, stepping closer to the railing and looking both ways. There were some benches—all empty—

“Do you think he went to the Benson Bridge to look for us?” Keith asked, voice pitched and wavering as he turned to his brother now. “What if he’s looking for us—”

“He isn’t looking for us. Come on—let’s head back,” he said again, nodding towards the gift shop. Keith stared at it, water dripping from his eyelashes, the tip of his nose, and he couldn’t tell if it tasted salty because it was actually made of tears. “Hey, come here,” Shiro said, tugging on Keith again. This time he didn’t pull away, and leaned into Shiro’s chest. He felt stiff, like he had a brace around his chest constricting his breathing. He forced his eyes to close because all he could do other than that was stare at the waterfall with that terrible, scared look in his eyes.

Keith hugged his cowboy hat wrapped in Lance’s sweatshirt to his stomach as they headed back to the others, who were watching and waiting for something to happen other than just Shiro and Keith returning. Hunk turned away from them with his hands over his face, and Pidge’s mess of soaked, curly brown hair just seemed to elongate the sorrow pulling down the corners of her lips. She opened her mouth to say something, hair clinging to her damp cheeks. Barely a squeak came out.

“He’s… not over there,” Keith said finally, sucking in a shaky breath. “He’s not there.”

Ulaz dragged a hand over his mouth, muttering, “Shit…” 

Pidge swallowed hard, looking frantically to Hunk, and then to Shiro and Keith. “So—wait, what are we gonna do? What if he’s s-still—still—”

“We’ll stick around for a little while longer,” Shiro said. “Let’s just… get to the car and dry off, yeah? C’mon.”

Shiro tugged his arm around Keith’s shoulders and guided him across the parking lot. The sirens had faded from the distance, but another bout of thunder struck somewhere in the distance as they all climbed into the SUV. Keith took one of the bucket seats, and leaned back with his eyes on the ceiling. It felt like he was burning up all over, and the water it set to boil was about to spill over his eyelashes. 

He dropped the jacket and hat and pushed the heels of his palms to his eyes. He should have given Lance his phone—He should have went with him—He should have—

“Wait—is this someone’s?” Ulaz asked, half in the passenger’s seat as he plucked off something from the crack in the cushion. Pidge leaned over to examine it, and then snatched it. 

“It looks like one of those smooth stones from the kiosk in South Dakota,” she said, which led Keith to drop his hands.

He cleared his throat and reached for it. He never really saw the one Lance kept on him, but he knew Pidge never kept any of the ones Allura took—those all went with Allura. He pulled out his own stone from his pocket to ensure that it wasn’t his.

“It’s Lance’s rock from Wall-Drug,” he said, and the implication of it made the tension in his eyes break loose. Keith dropped his hands to his lap, crying soundlessly as Ulaz dropped his gaze, still leaning in halfway. Shiro reached behind his chair to hold on to Keith’s knee as Hunk leaned over the armrests and plucked the rock from his loose fingers. He didn’t want to picture it any more than they did, but there it was. The image of Lance waiting for them in the passenger’s seat and just… fading away. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>   
>  I am honestly sobbing right now. 
> 
> The bridge thing [actually did happen](http://www.spokesman.com/stories/1995/sep/05/slide-injures-20-people-at-multnomah-falls/) but that was in [1995](https://findery.com/ChiefCurator/notes/a-tidal-wave-at-multnomah-falls). Lance has turned into Canon Shiro, though, so... ???
> 
> Feel free to fight me on [Tumblr](http://girlskylark.tumblr.com/) or something. There's at least one more chapter that's a mix of an epilogue, but we'll see what happens.


	21. Campfire Song

Two hours passed and none of them are strong enough to suggest leaving. Leaving meant forgetting about Lance, and none of them wanted that to happen any more than the next guy. And honestly, once Keith was somewhat in his right mind, he felt guilty for dragging Ulaz into this. But it wasn’t like Ulaz was having a great time, reading a book or whatever. None of them could seem to stop staring out the windows until the rain finally stopped. That was Washington for you.

Eventually, Pidge cleared her throat. Keith was studying the cars that came in from the road still. There weren’t many, considering the situation that happened at the bridge. There was a dry streak of blood running down Keith’s leg, but at least the wound stopped bleeding.

“We should… call Ramira. Let her know we’re almost to their house,” she said. 

“She doesn’t know you guys are coming,” Keith said, voice raspy. “It was supposed to be a surprise.”

“Here, Keith, give me your phone. I’ll text her for you,” Shiro suggested, and Keith dug around for it in Lance’s sweatshirt. His hands felt like he just came in from below-zero temperatures in Minnesota. He barely had function of his hands, let alone his fingers. His phone slipped out of his grasp once, but Pidge picked it up and handed it over to Shiro.

“Thanks,” he murmured, and got a, “No problem,” in response.

They listened to the soft patter of water dripping from the leaves over their car. They were facing the open, and they could see it like a wanna-be ocean. But there were specs of trees on the far horizon, so it wasn’t doing a very good job at it, in Keith’s opinion. He stared at it as he listened to Shiro type away on his phone. How his brother knew his password was beyond Keith. 

When Shiro passed the phone back, Keith said, “Lance took my clothes with him.”

There was a moment of silence before Keith looked at Pidge and explained, “He only had one set of clothes, so I lent him my clothes. He took them.”

“You think?” she said, frowning. “I don’t know, maybe they switched back?”

Keith was worried about it, so they rifled around in Keith’s things. He remembered Lance rolling up his shirt and stuffing it into a far corner of the duffle, and he spotted the grey fabric immediately. He plucked it out and held it up, and _Yup, that’s Lance’s shirt_. “I can’t believe you have a supernatural shirt. You own a ghost’s shirt,” she said, and Hunk laughed from the back, voice almost as stuffy as his nose.

Hunk sniffed before saying, “Yeah, just don’t wear it. Maybe it’ll randomly disappear.”

Keith giggled a little, holding the shirt up higher before lowering it to see Ulaz’s reaction. The man scoffed a little, glancing over at Shiro who laughed and said, “You could put it in a frame and mount it. There could be a plaque that says: ‘Here Lies The Ghost Shirt’.”

They all cracked up, as terrible as it was. Keith folded up the shirt neatly and placed it back into his duffle, and finally unraveled his cowboy hat. It was dented at the top, so he popped it back out and hung the strap onto the hook over his head meant for dry-cleaned suits and dresses. “You want me to bring up Ramira’s address?” he asked, and Shiro said, “Yes, please, that would be excellent.”

They settled in for the trip to the McClain’s house closer to the coast of the Pacific Ocean. They slowed past the Benson Bridge, and saw that the family of four was caught in the crossfire of the paramedics making sure everyone was okay from the tidal wave of water and rocks. Pidge scoffed a little, muttering, “Amateurs,” to which Shiro replied with, “There’s nothing professional about avoiding medical attention.”

“Or medical bills. We’re college students,” Keith argued. “It’s not like we needed stitches or anything.”

“That’s up for debate. It looks like Pidge’s arm is still bleeding,” Ulaz commented, reaching back to get a closer look at it. Now that Keith thought about it, the rock practically dented in her arm. She’d have a wicked crater where it hit. “If you want, I could stitch it up when we get to Lance’s parents’ house.”

“I dunno. Will it heal on its own?”

“Eventually, yeah, but you might have a gap or—”

“Perfect. No stitches then, thanks,” she squeaked out, tugging her arm away and laying her hand over the pinkish gauze. Ulaz eyed her for a moment before his perfectly shaped eyebrows tugged inward.

“You’re just saying that because you think I’m not excellent with a needle,” he commented, and she shrugged, going pink at the ears as she pulled her arm close to her chest. Keith smiled at them, and looked back at Hunk, who tried his best to smile back. It sort of worked.

Keith reached back and clapped a hand on Hunk’s leg. That seemed to be the button that prompted Hunk to say, “I think he planned to make himself disappear.”

“What makes you say that?” Pidge asked.

“I mean, we talked a bunch, but it’s like… he planned to drive the car to the parking lot on his own, but he wanted to talk to me. And th- then he was all, ‘You should go find the others. I’m gonna be here for a while’ which I thought was weird because we were just… we were just _talking_ about how he didn’t r-really want to disappear with all you guys watching him. 

“H- He said it made him feel like he _couldn’t_ , you know? Like you have to concentrate or something. I dunno,” Hunk confessed, twisting his hands between his knees, shoulders up to his ears. “I dunno. I feel bad for not sticking around.”

“But… if he _wanted_ to disappear, then—” Ulaz started.

“But I don’t think he _did_ , that’s the thing. B- But he knew he _had to_ because he couldn’t just… stick around.” Hunk ducked his head, like he was guilty for saying what they all knew was true. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be talkin’ about it.”

“It’s fine, Hunk,” Pidge murmured. “But I’m just surprised he didn’t wait till he saw his parents.”

“How would he be able to see them in the first place?” Keith asked, eyes down. “I mean, we couldn’t let them see him. He wouldn’t be able to be close to them. He wouldn’t even have been able to _hug_ them or whatever.”

“Maybe he just really wanted to hang out with you guys one last time. He… left kinda fast from what I heard,” Ulaz suggested with a shrug. “Maybe it wasn’t really the destination that he cared about. And I’m sure he wanted to see his parents and all that—they seem really nice—but… I’m wondering if maybe because we speculate Keith had something to do with it, if Lance was just here for you guys?”

“Plausible theory,” Pidge said quietly. “I can live with that. Hunk?”

“Yeah, that makes sense I guess. But I still want to see his mom. She gives the best hugs,” he murmured. “I need a hug.”

“I think we all do,” Shiro admitted quietly as he steered them back into the traffic running up and down the riverside. “But I’m glad that I thought to call Hunk when Keith said he was going on a random road trip with him.” Keith scowled at the back of his brother’s seat, and aggressively kicked it as Pidge and Hunk giggled.

“What’s that about?” Ulaz asked, grinning at Shiro as he propped his elbow up on the armrest, fingers fiddling with his earrings. When Shiro looked at him, Keith was glaring at that devilish smirk on his brother’s lips. And so commenced the story of how Keith tried to go on a solo road trip with Lance and played it off as a trip to Appleton with Hunk. It was what led to Hunk and Pidge hiding out in the trunk of Shiro’s SUV. It felt like more than a week had gone by.

They listened to Hunk’s music along the way, and as Keith dipped into his thoughts and studied the buildings as they came to pass, he started to smell something. It smelled like… smoke. 

“Do you guys smell that?” he asked, a little alarmed that it might be _real_ smoke. And if it wasn’t real smoke, then who could he be thinking about? _What_ could he be thinking about?

“Smell what?” Shiro asked.

“It smells like burning wood. Is something burning?” he asked, and tested the air before opening up his window. It didn’t fade at all, so he looked over at Pidge, who shrugged, her hair tossing around with the wind.

“Didn’t your old principal smell like charcoal?” Shiro asked, and Keith scoffed, muttering, “Why would I be thinking of _her_?” She smelt _burnt_ , like the charred edges of a brat on the grill, but this was pleasant and warm. It made him think of Yellowstone, when they cooked out and made delicious oatmeal over a campfire.

Keith leant back, brow knitting together. It smelled warm, and reminded him of the sensation Billie Jean gave him—hot printer paper that he could hold to his chest and keep his heart warm forever. He supposed he was thinking of everyone, of how much Lance’s disappearance must have hurt Hunk—

There was an absence of sweetness there that he recalled. It was so faint, it was barely recognizable beneath the smokey cover. The Froot Loops were gone and replaced with Skittles and campfires.

“Hunk—” Keith started, looking back at him. The name coated the back of his mind in campfire smoke. “Hunk, your scent changed.”

For a second he seemed to forget what they were talking about. The realization that Keith was a synesthete returned, and caused Hunk’s eyes to grow wide. “Seriously? What is it now?”

“Like campfires,” he explained. “It smells warm.”

“Do temperatures even _have_ a scent?” Pidge criticized, and earned a glare from Keith.

“Apparently a lot of scents synesthetes pick up are accompanied by temperatures,” Ulaz said, and upon the strange look he got from the others, he added, “I did some research after Keith said he had synesthesia.”

“Do I really smell like campfires?” Hunk asked, and Keith asked him to say his name out loud. When he did, Keith confirmed it—it sounded like campfires to him. Hunk leant back against the bench in the back, hands flopping to his sides. A soft smile came to his lips as he said, “ _So cool_ …”

“Am I still Skittles?” Pidge asked, and when Keith nodded, she pouted at him. “But I want to be something cool. Why can’t I be, like, basil or something?”

“I don’t pick the scents, ya know,” Keith argued with a scowl. She mimicked his glare and stuck her tongue out at him. He reached out to shove her, but she jerked away, slapping at his hands. They got into a cat fight before Hunk broke it up, waving his arms around and slapping theirs apart as he yelled, “Watch out! Fire! Hiss hiss—I’ll burn you!”

That just prompted Pidge to tackle him next—she went so far as to scramble out of her seat and lunge at him. He shrieked, “ _Eek!_ Don’t hurt me!”

She collapsed into the back seat with Hunk, leaning into his side just as the song changed, and Hunk gasped in remembrance of it. Keith groaned a little, tipping his head back against his headrest. That was all it took for them to leave the conversation behind in favor of singing the lyrics to the classics. Well, their generation’s classics. Hunk’s music brought back Avril Lavigne, Nickelback (much to their horror), and The All-American Rejects. They ended on a song that Hunk titled, “ _Ooh!_ This is Lance’s favorite song, we have to listen to it.”

Hunk knew all the lyrics—of course he did, since he and Lance probably listened to it all the time. Keith knew the lyrics simply because Lance used to play it on repeat on their speakers. Pidge giggled whenever Hunk attempted a body-roll, and Keith couldn’t contain his laughter. Lance used to do that all the time just for the hell of it. Ulaz started singing the lyrics and became a duet of sorts, with broad gestures and dramatically pining looks towards the red-eared driver trying to tell them all to calm down.

Keith refused to join in, especially because he was trying to help Shiro navigate as they drew closer and closer to the neighborhood the McClains lived in. Hunk and Ulaz were singing at the tops of their lungs, windows open, everyone’s hair flying about. Pidge’s mess of curls were all over her face as she laughed, clutching her stomach when Hunk dragged his hands down her face and begged in Spanish such-and-such—

“ _Guys!_ ” Keith shouted at them, prompting them all to shut up and look at him. He pointed out the window, and how the car had clearly stopped moving. “Shut up and get out of the car, for God’s sake—we’re here!”

In one huge rush, Pidge threw open her door, and she clamored out with Hunk at her heals, and Ulaz stretching up to the sky, long legs stretched forward. Keith climbed out his side and kicked his door shut after swinging his duffle over his shoulder. Pidge was saying, “Wow, nice place, huh?” as he stepped around the front of the vehicle, after his brother.

“It looks bigger than their old house,” Hunk commented. “They didn’t exactly plan for five kids when they bought the place.”

“It looks nice,” Shiro said, and Keith agreed. It was bright, and was probably one of the reasons why Ramira was so ecstatic when it came to sending pictures to Keith. It was painted a vibrant green with white trimming around the windows, with a lovely front porch. The garage was detached from the house, and was open to display all the boxes they had yet to unpack, and the vehicle they took over here. It was still overcast, so everything was a dull muted color except the vibrant exterior of the house, and the clearly colorful blinds draped inside the windows. 

Keith just happened to be looking at the windows to see the curtains swing close. He squinted a little at them, only to jump in surprise when the door burst open and Lance’s younger brother came bursting out screaming, “ _HUNK!_ ”

Aside from Hunk shouted, “ _Nolan!_ How you doin’ buddy!” Keith could hear Lance’s mom scolding from inside, “ _Nolan!_ Who’s here?”

Nolan lunged at Hunk, slamming straight into him with his arms tight around Hunk’s torso. Hunk grunted at the impact, but laughed nonetheless, especially when Nolan released him to gasp at Keith. He ran at Keith next, but instead of giving him a hug, he screeched to a halt and reached his hand out to shake Keith’s. “Lance told me not to tackle you, so handshake,” he said, and Keith smiled a little, giving Lance’s brother’s hand a squeeze.

“Very polite of you,” he commented with a laugh.

The front door squeaked open, and they heard Lance’s mother take in a deep breath. Keith looked just as Ramira clasped a hand to her chest and hurried down the steps and across the yard. She looked like a woman on a mission with the way she marched across the grass. 

Along the way, she huffed, “I can’t believe you, Keith. I can’t believe you—sneaking my favorite little boy across the country _without me knowing_. Hunk-y, get over here this instant.”

Hunk blushed, getting all bashful as he held his arms out and gathered her up in them. “Okay, _mom_ ,” he laughed, squeezing her jokingly and swinging her side-to-side. She was so small and plump beside him, with her warm edges and dark chocolate scent.

She reached up and pulled Hunk’s face down to press two kisses to his cheeks before hurrying over to Keith, cooing, “I’m so glad you all came—Pidge! Pidge, get over here, dear.”

“Mrs. McClain! It’s so nice to finally meet you,” Pidge squeaked out, giggling when Lance’s mother wrapped her up in a tight hug.

“Just Ramira is fine, dear. I love all the picture you post on Facebook! You are just so adorable.”

“Thanks… Ramira,” Pidge said, giggling as Lance’s mother kissed her cheeks. She sniffed a little as she found Nolan trying to climb onto Hunk’s back. She shooed him away from Hunk before turning to Shiro and Ulaz.

“Now I recognize Keith’s brother—have we met before?” she asked Shiro, who shook his head and reached a hand out to her.

“No, and you can call me Shir—” he started, only to get the rest of his words squeezed out of him by a tight hug. 

She then went over to Ulaz, hands on her hips, “Now who are you? I don’t recognize you.”

“Ah, no, I don’t live in Minnesota,” he said, and explained that he just finished up an internship and was picked up by all of them and was now along for the ride. Afterwards, he added, “I heard that your son passed away. That’s incredibly unfortunate—he was an great person.”

Keith wasn’t sure what to expect from bringing Lance into the conversation, and somehow he didn’t expect Ramira to not burst into tears. Instead, she sighed a little, a sad smile coming to her lips and causing her eyes to squint a little up at him. “Well, God works in mysterious ways. Thank you, though—even though you’ve never met him.”

“Right, right. With how much they talked about him, it’s almost as if I had met him,” Ulaz said and as Ramira turned towards Keith and Hunk, Ulaz winked at them. Keith smiled a little, his throat tight as Ramira pulled them in for another hug. It wasn’t until a few moments later that Keith realized she was hiding her tears against Hunk’s shoulder.

“You two were such great friends to my son,” she murmured, giving Keith a hard pat on the back before pulling away a little, dabbing her fingers under her lower eyelashes. “Oh, goodness—sorry. I shouldn’t be crying. Nolan, go inside and get your siblings. Let them know who’s here,” she ordered, and whistled him inside with a sharp jab of her thumb towards the door. He kicked off the ground at a spring, and flew through the front door. 

After he was gone, Ramira looked up at them again and said, “This is such a lovely surprise, Hunk—I’m glad you could make it.”

“Not a problem. Keith wanted it to be a surprise,” he said, smiling at her. “And I’m sorry I couldn’t make it to the funeral. It really bummed me out—with finals and everything.”

“I know, dear, I know,” she said, patting him on the chest. She bit into her bottom lip, brushing a hand over her cheek again. “It was beautiful. I had a friend of mine take videos of the whole thing. We’ll have to go through them another time.”

“That’d be great. My parents sent a few pictures, not much. I heard you had an awesome photo collage. It took up, like, an entire wall or something like that?” he commented, and Ramira laughed a little, batting a hand at him as she said, “ _Half_ a wall. And it wasn’t _that_ great. Okay, maybe it was perfect.”

They all laughed a little before Ramira asked, “So how was the trip? I’m sure you all had a great time.”

Hunk laughed a bit, murmuring, “Well…” Keith smirked at him, and finished it off with, “Yeah, we had a lot of fun.”

  


  


Dinner with the McClains wasn’t as hectic as the last time Keith had a meal with them. Everyone was pretty melancholy, and with Lance all on their minds, they focused their attention on the semi-stranger of the group. Ulaz filled the conversation with all the stories he shared with them, and some extra ones. He talked about his family in San Diego, his family in India. They were all absolutely thrilled to have him at the dinner table, perhaps because no one wanted to talk about the seat being filled at the table.

Keith felt… oddly okay with it all, though. He expected to have a tough time talking to them, for whatever reason. He didn’t have Lance as a buffer now when it came to talking with Ramira. After dinner, they all sat together under the vaulted ceiling in the living room, where the television took up the empty space on the wall, and the couches were a mess and hardly seemed to fill up the floor at all. The surfaces were all hard and wood, drywall, what-have-you, so their voices echoed and eventually, so did their laughter. 

Ramira cracked out a bottle of red wine and gave a glass to everyone except Nolan, who got cranberry juice instead. When she poured the glasses for Pidge, Keith, and Hunk, she said, “Don’t tell anyone I gave you a sip.”

“ _Mama_ …” Lance’s oldest brother, Edwin, complained. 

“ _What?_ I just gave them a sip,” she countered. She giggled a little, a devilish smirk on her lips as she emptied out the bottle into her own glass. “Do you have any pictures from your trip? I bet the drive was beautiful.”

“It was!” Pidge exclaimed, and threw them all into a large description of the landscape and terrane and the places they stopped at. Keith was going through his phone trying to find pictures, but most of them… had Lance in them. For whatever reason, Keith feared that his image would fade, but that just wasn’t how it worked. So they couldn’t really show Ramira any of the pictures.

That night, after Nolan was put to bed, Lance’s older siblings called it quits for the night. His sisters were leaving early in the morning for a flight back to Milwaukee, so they had to finish packing as well. They squeezed the living daylights out of Hunk before saying goodbye to the rest of them. Hunk was still recovering his breath when they finally left to go upstairs. Ramira set to work getting them all situated for bed in the living room. She asked Keith to help her get the box of blankets from the garage, so he complied and followed her out the front door. 

It was muggy out, and as the screen door swung shut, they were accompanied by the crescendo of crickets and peepers in the grasses calling out to them. It smelled like dew and fresh rain as they walked through the grass and got their feet wet in the process. Ramira pushed the garage door open and said, “I _think_ I know which one it is…”

“If not we can just go through all of them, huh?” Keith commented, studying the massive amount of boxes in there. Ramira laughed, swatting him on the shoulder.

“I wanted to talk to you about something, though,” she confessed, marching into the horde of boxes beside the truck. She sifted through them as she explained, “Before Lance passed away, he left a few notes behind. He put yours in an envelope—I haven’t opened it yet, but… I figured it was something I should give to you in person. I hope you don’t mind?”

He stared at her for a moment before clearing his throat and saying, “N-No, I don’t mind. He left a note for me?”

“He was very thorough,” she said, and took a moment to gather her breath, her fingers hooked under the flap of a box. She brushed a hand over her eyes and said, “He wrote a letter for each of us, his grandparents… Hunk has one as well—I still have it, but I nearly sent it to him in the mail because I wasn’t sure if he was going to come visit. I knew he would one day, but… th-this is a more… _urgent_ matter I guess. Best not to let it sit and fester.”

Keith nodded as she pulled out the box and handed it to him. Her eyes were red. “There—this should have a few blankets in it. I’m gonna… look around for the sleeping bags. Ask Hunk to come out to help, okay?”

He nodded, mostly because he couldn’t find his voice to speak. He carried the box over to the front door and knocked with his foot. Pidge came to open the door, and he stepped through, saying, “Hunk, she needs help getting the sleeping bags in.”

While Hunk went out, they dispersed the blankets and started to build makeshift beds on the wood floors. The entire time Keith thought about the letter. What would it say? He dreaded it almost as much as he dreaded falling asleep over a week ago with the sound of Lance’s hateful words in his head. Would the letter just be filled with more of those insults? The realization that Lance never liked Keith in the first place? 

But he knew better now. He knew Lance hadn’t meant it. He believed the Lance he knew now, but he couldn’t help but fret over it for the entire time Hunk and Ramira were gone.

All the lights in the house were off except for the kitchen and the living room. He could see the cabinets from where he sat, perched on his makeshift bed. Ulaz was on the couch after what apparently was a huge argument involving a lot of, “You’re a guest and you shouldn’t have to sleep on the ground!” followed by, “I’m a hitchhiker! I _should_ be the one sleeping on the ground.”

Suffice to say both Shiro and Ulaz looked grumpier than usual.

When Ramira and Hunk came back in, she was on a mission once more. She hurried out of the living room, fretting over finding the envelopes. She rifled around in the kitchen for them, and at the desk stationed against the wall the kitchen shared with the living room. When she slammed the drawer closed, she arrived in the living room holding up two slim white envelopes written to Keith and Hunk.

They got up and hurried to the kitchen, eager to read the dying words of a friend they just spent a week with. Ramira left them at the kitchen table, placing a kiss on both of their heads before saying she’d be off getting ready for bed. “Take your time, boys,” she told them before heading up the stairs.

Keith glanced over at Hunk, breathing in crisp, burnt firewood as he did so. Hunk took a deep breath and confessed, “I dunno. I honestly think it’s just gonna be what he told me earlier today. He… He repeated a lot of stuff he told me b-before he left, ya know?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Keith said quietly, glancing down at his envelope. Lance wrote his name in all caps, scratched into the paper with a ballpoint pen. “I’m worried he’s gonna… repeat everything he told me. Before he passed away.”

“He’s not. Trust me, Keith” Hunk said sharply, shaking his head. Keith shrugged, leaning far over the table with the envelope held out like he couldn’t bare to have it close to where his tender heart was. Eventually, Hunk set his own envelope down and said, “You want me to open it first?”

After a moment spent worrying his lip between his teeth, Keith nodded mutely and passed it to Hunk. Hunk tore the top of the envelope open, and slipped out several, back-to-back, lined pieces of paper filled with neat pen marks. Hunk swallowed hard and set the empty envelope aside. “Well. Um… here goes. I’ll just read a few paragraphs.”

Keith nodded, and studied Hunk’s face as he read through the pages. Keith tried not to focus no the words he could see on the back of the pages, and the words he could see illuminated from the light above them. The kitchen was fairly empty, and the walls around the kitchen table were a muted, pinkish-tan. Keith ran his fingers up and down the grain of the wooden table, and watched Hunk’s frown and creased brow ease a little when he looked up at Keith. “I-I think it’s fine. Yeah, you can read it,” he said, passing the pages to Keith.

Keith couldn’t focus at all until he was on the second paragraph. He had to go back and reread the first, mouthing the words to himself as he did so:

  


_Dear Keith,_

_Wow. I feel like shit writing this. It sounds like a horrible step up from a break-up text, and I’m sorry to put it this way but by now you probably hate the sound of my name and you’re probably praying to God that I’ll never come back because I fucked up. It was never your fault that I fucked up—I really had no reason to say those things to you. I feel like shit. I FEEL LIKE SHIT. I can never say that enough and I’ll take it to my grave honest to God._

_But you probably thought I wouldn’t. I probably convinced you that I didn’t feel guilty for saying any of it but I DID. I don’t know how to say it in person without breaking down like that again. It’s gotten so hard not to break down like that and I_ know _it’s on the verge of every slight-argument we have. Or when I blow things out of proportions. I can’t stop myself from doing that, or feeling jealous, or feeling insecure. I never mean to make myself out to be the jealous one and I completely accused YOU of being the jealous one. And honestly I’m flattered. God, I wish I could have just said that. I’m flattered you felt jealous, and the fact that you showed some sort of emotion. All of my emotions were a mess, huh? I’m glad at least ONE of us is normal._

_Which brings me to why I’m writing this. This is everything I couldn’t and didn’t want to tell you in person, and a text wouldn’t really suffice, and I never wanted to have to tell you this. I hoped one day it would all “magically disappear” but shit like this doesn’t just “magically disappear” because I want it to, or because suddenly I want to “make myself better for you”. I don’t want to make myself better for anyone, and I don’t think I should. This is who I am and I hate myself for it. I make mistakes, say the wrong thing, my emotions are a mess and I feel like shit constantly because of it._

_Do you ever just feel like you could take back something you said? Maybe you said the wrong answer in class and you can’t stop thinking about it because it happened in ELEMENTARY SCHOOL. You badgered yourself over it for years. Every wrong answer just another check on your list of failures. Everything I say feels like it’s being documented, like everyone has some incredible memory bank full of stupid shit I said or did or even THOUGHT. And it sounds ridiculous, and therapy lets me know that it’s ridiculous, but talking about it never helped. I stopped talking about it a while ago ever since I stopped going to therapy. And “Oh, there goes Lance! Better than ever! So proud of MY STRONG BOY.”_

_Strength is honestly something I lack. I don’t have enough upper body strength to hold this dumpster truck full of crap I can’t handle anymore. I don’t want to say there’s a “cherry on the top” of anything I did that led me here, and I don’t want you to think that you were ever the cherry on the top. You didn’t “tip the scale” or anything like that. I just… don’t want you to have to deal with this mess. I don’t want you to help me hold this dumpster truck that’s on fire and there’s probably a grenade in there somewhere because we’d both die from it. I never wanted to make you feel chained to a suicide bomb—like you're linked to the clip on a grenade and the second you step away from it it explodes. That’s too much pressure to put on one person._

_But I want you to know that I seriously saw a flicker of a future with you. Which is honestly impressive because I never saw myself living past twenty-eight (specifically twenty-eight. It was a special number). I fucked it up, obviously, and you probably don’t care to hear that I totally would have had your adopted babies or whatever. And I know you hate kids and stuff, but I honestly think it’d be funny. Imagine it. But I probably think it’s funny because I know it could never happen. Sometimes those things are funny._

_Honestly, this is all just to let you know that you weren’t the cherry on the top. You didn’t tip me over the edge. You did everything you could have done, I think. I had a lot of fun with you, and I’m glad you took my gay virginity. I really hope my mama doesn’t read through this. Don’t show this to her, okay? I mean, don’t blame her for everything I said, okay? She didn’t raise me to say things like that anyway. She’d be even more disappointed in me than she already is._

_Is it okay if I end this with “love”? I’m going to because I mean it and I hope you understand._

_Love, Lance_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My friend Edwin: "Put me in your fanfiction." Me: "No! That wouldn't make sense!" Edwin: "But you have to." Me: "Okay. Well, Lance has an older brother. You could be the evil older brother." Edwin: "What makes him evil? I need to learn from him if I'm going to play his part in the movie." Me: "... What movie."
> 
> Sorry about the delayed chapter. I had a long day yesterday and homework is RUINING MY LIIIFE. This ended up being longer than intended as well, which is why I had to split it up into two parts. I will get back to you all later tomorrow! Hopefully! Who knows! 
> 
> Also, I never really specified Lance's condition much? I don't think I mentioned a whole lot aside from anxiety/depression because I didn't want to label him. Sometimes not labeling something lets people draw their own conclusions from it. And while it's great that I was able to write a relatable character for you guys, it also sucks because the bottom line of it all is that a lot of people suffer from mental illness. And even if I'm able to help just one person with this story, that would be swell. Hearing about your guys' stories is one of the most eye-opening things as an individual who doesn't suffer from mental illness.


	22. Return At Your Leisure

Ramira evidently had the entire day planned for the beach.

It wasn’t that the beach was an exactly _warm_ place this time of year—far from it. The breeze was kind of chilly, so they all wore sweatshirts with their shorts, and brought blankets along for the trip. The water was even colder, but Keith wouldn’t find that out until later.

It was a half hour drive from the McClains’ neighborhood, and with everyone who came with—Ramira, her husband, Edwin, and Nolan in their truck, and the rest of them in the SUV—and another five minute walk from the parking lot. The concrete on the parking lot was smeared white white sand that covered up the parking spots, so Ulaz just parked the SUV wherever he could—right beside the McClains.

Keith helped carry some of the blankets, and there was a picnic basket and a cooler that was split between Edwin and Hunk. They walked ahead, talking about such-and-such—Keith had to remind himself that Hunk knew them all his life. The McClains were family to Hunk.

There was a shallow, sandy path leading between two divots of sand dunes covered in thin wisps of grass. The sky was starting to clear up, which Lance’s father commented on: “Lucky day for us. We get a bit of sun.”

“I _told_ you it was a good idea to come to the beach today,” Ramira jested with him, nudging him in the side. 

Nolan was running up and down the sand dunes, burning tracks into the pristine surface, skidding down, and kicking up clouds of sand. He honestly looked like a miniature version of Lance, but his hair couldn’t seem to lie flat and he was missing one of his teeth. Whenever he smiled, his tongue tried to stick through the gap.

As they got closer to the ocean, the wind pulled back the baby hairs on Keith’s face, and tugged at their clothes. It tasted salty on his tongue, and brought with it the mix of scents surrounding him. He took a moment to breath it all in from the peak of the path. Pidge and Nolan were chasing each other to the water. Pidge’s sunglasses were up in her rat’s nest of curls, her short shorts trapping the hem of her tank top as she kicked into the water, pouncing after Nolan, and shrieking at the bitter coldness of it.

Ulaz had his backpack on, and his socks tucked into the boots he held in one hand. Shiro’s boots were in his other hand, since Shiro was holding onto the cooler. A deep shadow pulled back from the beach, coating the water in a shimmering blue, and the grayish sand in pure white. Warmth spread over them, and Keith closed his eyes against it. His chest ached for something he knew wasn’t there physically, but he tried not to mind it. He knew that whatever the case, Lance would want Keith to have a good time on the Pacific Coast for him. It was sad to think that Lance was so close to seeing the ocean himself.

  


  


The McClains stayed in Portland, even if their sons and daughters eventually moved elsewhere. One of Lance’s sisters started work in Chicago soon after Keith and the others showed up, so it would work out for them. And eventually Nolan was in high school, which was weird and Hunk always said it was weird, and earned plenty of punches in the arm for it whenever he said it in front of Lance’s youngest brother. 

But before they could get that far, Ramira sent them off two days after they spent the afternoon at the beach. She gave them a box full of cookies and a bag full of bizarre candies and lolly pops shaped like stop-and-go lights. She kissed them on the heads and tried her best to keep Hunk there for a while longer, but they all had to go eventually.

Keith kept Lance’s letter in the bottom of his duffle where it wouldn’t get lost—hopefully. But he figured even if he did lose it, he felt better knowing that Lance talked to him in person rather than a step up from a breakup text. Hunk seemed to feel the same way, but that didn’t stop him from sealing it away in its envelope and tucking it safely between the folds of one of his books.

They took the winding roads down the coast on the edges of rocky cliffs that Hunk fretted over, and Ulaz leaned over much to discontent of Shiro’s nerves. He went so far as to pull Ulaz away from the guard railing by the back of his sweatshirt and say, “You’ll fall over if you keep doing that.” Ulaz would snicker and tug on Shiro’s arm, prying him as close to the railing as he could. He’d put his arm around Shiro’s torso, and Pidge would stick a finger down her throat and fake-gag at Hunk, who would giggle and bat his hand at her.

They spent some time at a black sand beach, and that was where Pidge’s phone buzzed in her pocket and she hummed, “That’s strange,” and showed it to Keith. He leaned over the screen and held it closer, reading _ALLURA_ above the text. The waves were rolling in and out and roaring through their ears as Keith scowled at the screen.

“Are you gonna respond?” he asked, and Pidge shrugged, frowning at her name. “What’d she say?”

She opened the message and read it aloud: “Hey. Sorry I dropped off like that. I figured it’d be better if I didn’t talk to you for a bit considering. You seem like a really cool person. Would it be cool if we talked more.”

She lowered her phone a little, staring at Keith and murmuring, “I’m so weak. Keith, stop me.”

“What’s going on?” Hunk asked, hurrying over across the sand. There was a mist in the air that caused all their hair to show up a bit damp and flat, and Hunk’s bangs were flattened across his forehead. Pidge showed him the text, and he asked, “Well, are you gonna talk to her?”

“You of all people should be telling me no,” she argued, hands on her hips. “Do you want me to ask about your VISA?”

“That’s not a good conversation starter, but yeah, eventually I wanna know what happened to it. I’m kinda scared to look at the account,” he confessed with a wince. Pidge frowned up at him, and then down at her phone.

“She’s so cool… I don’t know. She stole your money, though—I don’t want to talk to her if you guys all hate her,” she confessed, scuffing her foot in the sand. “Well? _Do_ you guys hate her?”

“A little. But I don’t know—if she hadn’t stollen Hunk’s money, I’d’ve liked her,” Keith admitted, shrugging a little. Hunk said the same, which just led Pidge to throw her arms down and whine about them not giving her a definitive answer. 

Keith wouldn’t _really_ know whether or not Pidge started talking to Allura until his senior year in college. Pidge would be a junior, and would burst into his bedroom in their apartment and shriek about having to clean up the place because Allura was visiting. Evidently it was supposedly common knowledge that Keith somehow missed out on.

As Pidge bristled over the black sand, Keith looked over at his brother, who was trying to stop Ulaz from _climbing on everything_. The man had no concept of how to take a nature hike _normally_. He was climbing on boulders and trying to go out on the ocean where they were slick with water and slime, and Shiro was half in the water trying to stop him. Keith was thankful they left their phones on shore because Ulaz slipped on the rock, and in the midst of Shiro trying to catch him, they both plunged into the water and were enveloped in a huge, cold wave of water and foam. They resurfaced, gasping, and Ulaz started laughing like a hyena. 

It took forever for them to get dry, and Shiro refused to let either of them into the SUV in fear of ruining the seats. So while they waited for Shiro and Ulaz to dry off in the parking lot, Keith, Hunk, and Pidge made drip castles with the black sand sinking between their fingers.

Eventually they were on the road again. They spent less time dilly dallying, and another night driving on the road. Keith’s favorite part happened to be the redwood forests. The trees were _massive_ , and he turned into Ulaz with how much time he spent trying to climb on top of fallen logs. Ulaz always beat him to it, and was quicker with it as well. Keith was convinced the man had spikes on the tips of his boots to assist in climbing the side of trees.

They crossed parlous bridges, the sides of cliffs, on the shoreline where water lapped up the rocks to their right. Driving at night was terrifying, especially with the fog, and Ulaz always drove them at night due to Shiro’s anxiety about it, Hunk’s general fear of cliffs and fog, and Pidge’s… well, lack of a license. Keith didn’t mind it since he was indifferent about most things like driving at night. 

When they got to San Francisco, Pidge tried holding her breath across the Golden Gate Bridge. It was too long of a ride, and she turned red in the face before gasping for air as they neared the end of it. She gasped out, “ _Fuck_ , so close.” Much to her distaste, Shiro was still holding his breath, and hollered triumphantly when he won. They could see Oakland from across the Bay, and Keith was thrilled to see the familiar city again. Shiro sat beside him on the bucket seats and gave his shoulder a squeeze before pointing out their favorite vantage point above the city atop one of those stupidly massive hills.

It was morning when they showed up, so Keith and Shiro recommended they all go to Mel’s Diner for brunch. Shiro drove them through the city after a quick pitstop to look at the Golden Gate Bridge. Keith always felt so free being so high up above everything. As they cruised up and down the hills of San Fran, Keith felt his nostalgia take over, and it ached somewhere deep inside of him. He never thought he’d come back to San Fran until after college, and it felt so great to be back. 

They ate at the retro diner and paid a quarter to play a classic off of the jute box. The golden hue of dandelions came through the speaker, accompanied by “ _BAH BAH BAH!_ ” and Pidge shimmying on the checkered tiles. Hunk spun her around, and Keith hid his face in his hands and tried not to turn too red. _Sweet Caroline_ reminded him of summer, and of the chlorine he used to try and drown out listening to the classics Shiro would suggest. That seemed so long ago.

It took forever to show everyone where Keith and Shiro used to live. There were two places in San Fran that they lived before Oakland, and even then it was never permanent. They liked their Oakland house better, with all its pseudo-old appeal with the front porch and skinny upper floors. They couldn’t really go inside, so they just looked at it from the road.

It wasn’t a surprise that the place looked the same as ever, and while it was nice to take a glimpse at it, they had to keep moving. Stanford wasn’t all that far away, and if they had plans on getting back to Minnesota before Shiro’s two week vacation was over, they couldn’t waste time. Keith found himself in the back seat for that trip, wishing Lance was around to horse around with. Lance had a habit of kicking him and forcing Keith to hold his feet on the car ride here, and Pidge didn’t seem interested in letting Keith give her a foot massage. He offered, but she declined it _fast_.

“Lance always let me give him foot rubs,” Keith whined.

“Yeah, but Lance didn’t have ticklish feet. So unless you want a knee to the nose…” she said, glancing over at his frown. “Exactly.”

Keith spent a lot of time thinking about the fact that Lance’s shirt was still somewhere in his duffle. He took it out a few times on the way down from Portland, and would stare at it wondering if Lance was still wearing his shirt, somewhere out there. He supposed it had a lot to do with what he believed in… but he wanted to believe that Lance was still wearing his clothes. Not in a creepy sense, but it was kind of funny to think that his clothes died before _he_ did. 

Out of curiosity, Keith reached into his duffle again and tried to figure out what, exactly, about the shirt seemed significant. No— _different_. Like when Keith first saw Lance in the apartment looking for his phone. He sniffed it, and it smelled like Lance’s cologne from what he remembered, and the fact that it somehow remained intact was just a testament to how otherworldly this shit was. He wondered of Axe Body Spray had some divine powers that transcended purgatory—

It didn’t glow, and the fabric felt _incredibly_ soft—softer than any shirt _Keith_ ever knew of Lance wearing. He checked for the tag, but there wasn’t one on the bottom hem, so he looked behind the collar and—

“Holy shit,” Keith breathed out, eyes wide as he looked to Pidge. “Pidge, get over here and look at this.”

Pidge climbed into the back seat with him, and they leaned together as Keith reversed the shirt and showed her… the _entire_ inside. It looked like the opposite side of screen printing ink. It was a faint, speckled white, and there wasn’t really any rhyme or reason to it, except for the top where the company name was supposed to be. 

“What the hell is this… it looks like it says… ‘ _return at your leisure._ ’” she said, squinting at it. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Maybe it’s his receipt,” Keith suggested with a laugh, but the joke suddenly caused them both to frown at the consequences of that. What if his shirt… _was_ his return card to Heaven? _Shit, this has to be the worst form of shirt theft known to mankind_ , Keith thought. They tugged the shirt between them, each wanting to get a closer look at it. The type was small, almost _minuscule_ and faint in its white color. It was a thin sans serif, wide spacing between each meticulous letter. “Why would his shirt have a message written that tiny on it?”

“What are you talking about? This is totally a puzzle,” she said. “And we obviously don’t have to return it any time soon, so… hang on to it? I guess? We’re _totally_ putting this shit under the microscope when we get back though.”

Keith laughed and agreed to it—that was such an obviously excellent idea. It didn’t stop them from staring at the pattern, however, even though they finished inspecting the label. They stared at it up until the point where Shiro and Ulaz switched driving, since Ulaz knew the Stanford territory better than any of them.

Keith wrapped up the shirt again and tucked it into his duffle, still constantly thinking, _return at your leisure_. Was it an instruction to Lance? Did he even _come_ with a set of instructions? _Maybe we returned him too soon…_ Keith thought, and hoped that was right, and that maybe the chances of Lance being able to stick around longer were _actually_ there. This entire time they thought there was a limit to Lance’s time on Earth. But… maybe it was the exact opposite. Lance was able to leave whenever he so desired, and that put Keith’s mind at ease.

They parked near Stanford’s epicenter of excitement, and where student groups met, where prospective students toured, and where parents bought pride gear, much to the embarrassment of their children. Ulaz walked them in explaining everything like he was on a tour, and when asked by Hunk, he replied with, “I _may_ or may not have dabbled as a tour guide hear my sophomore year. But that’s besides the point—we’ll head over there in a moment, but that’s the memorial church. And if you look closely, it—”

“—Looks like it’s straight out of _Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag_ ,” Keith said, and Pidge gasped out, “You’re _right!_ ”

Ulaz hesitated, steps faltering for a moment before he picked up the pace again, “That was _not_ what I was going to say, but you’re completely right. I can’t argue with you there.”

They went on through the Main Quad area, and it felt like they were in the Caribbean. There were palm trees sprouting from circles of potted plants, and a uniquely Hispanic look to the red rooftops and tanned exteriors of the buildings. They walked in the shadows of archways and avoided the bookstore at all costs—“Ridiculous prices, even for the rich kids who go here,” Ulaz explained.

Campus Drive, where Frat Row was located, was farther from the bookstore, but they didn’t mind the trek. Keith never once set foot on Stanford grounds before—it just seemed out of his league—so it was entertaining to hear Ulaz talk it up so much. The man had more knowledge about Stanford than Keith did of his own university. There weren’t many students up and about—just the ones who lived there over the summer—and the lawns were all pristine and green with half-hearted flowerbeds and excellent paint jobs. Along the way they somehow bumped into a distant friend of Ulaz’s, which led to a… tour of a completely different frat.

As they walked through the front door, Ulaz commented, “I called Rollo earlier about the party for tonight, have you heard anything about it?”

“Oh, yeah—I think it’s still on last I heard. I mean, it’ll be a fuckin’ get-together that’s for sure. Not exactly a rager or shit like that,” the guy said.

“Right, right. Everyone sort of leaves campus in the summer, but some guys still live around in the neighborhoods or sublease apartments,” Ulaz explained to them as they walked through an elegant foyer that had Hunk pining to go to school there, if only for the sake of living next to fraternity houses like these ones. He wouldn’t likely be able to afford living in one, anyway.

“I didn’t realize they’d be hosting a party just ‘cause you came back,” Shiro commented, and Ulaz snorted, saying, “Oh come on, you flatter me. Please, boost my ego a little more.”

Keith giggled at him, and only earned a glare from Shiro in the process. 

Hunk was wrapped up in a conversation with the two guys chilling in the kitchen area, sitting on the countertops. They were loud and inviting at the same time, and somehow managed to rope Hunk into a card game they were playing. Keith wandered off with Pidge to look at the dining room while Shiro and Ulaz chatted up their tour guide. 

The dining room was spacious and filled with wide open windows. It gave off the vibe of a relaxing home at the lakeside, like they were preparing to set up a nice breakfast on the deck before laying out on the grass all day, getting sunburnt around the shadow lines of the book they held over their faces. Pidge propped one of the doors open and leaned out, stretching high and saying, “Ah! Fresh air! I could get used to this!”

Keith laughed, propping his hands on his hips as he stepped out onto the deck beside her. He looked back inside where the sunlight streamed onto the kitchen counters where Hunk was leaning over, playing a card on the granite surface. He happened to look at his brother at _just_ the right moment to catch Shiro grazing his hand over Ulaz’s, and linking their fingers together.

He was fairly positive that was the first time Shiro and Ulaz ever held hands—except for maybe all those times Keith had his back to his brother beach after beach, redwood forest after redwood forest. Maybe even at a few waterfalls. But Keith wouldn’t mention having sensed any of those as a blend of alcohol and gasoline. The two together tasted like someone Keith wouldn’t want to meet, and it’d take a little getting used to, but the maraschino cherries sweetened up the deal.

Keith sometimes thought about how his synesthesia sometimes felt like a foreshadow, or a third eye. Shiro always said he overthought it, and that we could all naturally feel someone’s presence coming up behind them, or somehow recognize that faint inhale of breath someone takes before they speak—but to register it with a particular smell was something else entirely.

When they eventually did get to Kappa Sigma, it was everything Hunk hoped and dreamed of. It was everything they all knew Lance wanted to see, and it just prompted Keith to engage more with it than he would have, standing back and letting Lance and Hunk take over the tour themselves. He never really had a huge fascination with fraternities in general—he never thought much of them aside from their social nature, and the parties he went to. But this was an entire world to Lance and Hunk that Keith never understood before… _them_. Before _Lance_. But… he could appreciate it for Lance, and so he did.

They were introduced to the guys at the house, and it was all just a mix of smells that Keith remembered, but forgot the names to. A few of them were reoccurring from people he knew at the U, so those would be easy to catch and hang on to. Rollo showed up—evidently the president of the house that was an apprentice to Ulaz—with an air of hawthorn tree flowers. It was a scent Keith never wished to put a name to, and he felt bad for practically glaring at Rollo for bringing it into his life. It wasn’t that Rollo was a terrible person—his name just had the smell of sulfur and rotten eggs. It wasn’t _Keith’s_ fault, necessarily, nor was it Rollo’s. 

Suffice to say, Keith tried his best to avoid Rollo, and evidently he was doing a terrible job of masking it. Eventually Shiro came up to him and whispered, “So what does he smell like?”

“Hawthorn flowers,” Keith practically choked out.

Shiro whistled and laughed a little, saying, “That is _so_ unfortunate.”

Rollo left Ulaz to provide the tour—thank _God_ —which brought them through the entire first floor, to the second floor where Ulaz’s room used to be. He showed it to them, and explained, “I shared it with the vice prez, and it doesn’t come furnished or anything. Anything bigger than a double is just shit luck—we learned the hard way. He came in with a _queen_.”

“No shit,” Shiro laughed, and tried to measure up the size of it.

“No shit. And yeah, it’s cool for lounging and stuff, but when you try working at your desk over there it gets _super_ cramped,” Ulaz laughed, crossing his arms as they all came in and examined the place. The floor was kind of a mess of clothes and shit, which the guy who lived there apologized for before they even got up the stairs.

That night wasn’t a rager. It wasn’t a drunken mess like the parties Ulaz explained. It wasn’t fucked up or mind-blowing or anything like that. Sure, there was alcohol, and Keith may have had a few drinks too many, but as soon as he mentioned Lance, the night became melancholy. It wasn’t a _bad_ sort of melancholy. It settled in all of their chests like some comforting weight. Like in the winter when you bundle up in dozens of blankets in front of the fireplace. Hunk gave off the scent of fire smoke, and they all gathered around it while Hunk explained who Lance was, stories about Lance.

They talked about how odd it was, to lose someone so young and so close to you. They talked about people in their classes dying from such-and-such—a car accident, alcohol abuse, drowning in the river—and how bizarre it was to feel sympathy for someone you just… never really met before. How bizarre it was for people to feel entitlement over someone’s dead body even if they just talked to them once or twice in their lives. How they all felt like that girl, in Keith and Pidge’s horticulture lab, talking about Lance like he was some great friend of hers. 

By some miracle of God, Keith didn’t cry. Usually alcohol made it easier to cry, to laugh, to get _angry_. He felt the melancholy of everyone talking in a circle on the wooden paneling of the back deck, and the music swaying in the background. It wasn’t the sort of party that would have a DJ, by any means—there was nothing formal about it. There were sorority girls there, and friends from classes, kids who lived off campus, just students that happened to pass by. It was such a welcoming atmosphere. Calm.

And it made sense, that people died. And sure, it was weird that someone so young and so close to Keith passed away, but it wasn’t an odd occurrence. The reality of it was this: death was something that had a stigma to it. Like it _shouldn’t_ be normal. And maybe it had something to do with the uncertainty of it, but whatever the case, everyone dies. He just wished it wouldn’t have to be so soon.

  


  


They spent the night at Kappa Sigma after a wild journey back to the parking lot in the middle of the goddamn night. Pidge was already passed out by the time Shiro recommended they move the SUV, and Ulaz was more or less gone. Hunk was in a deep, intense conversation with a girl who smelled like pine needles, and they didn’t want to disturb him, so just Shiro and Keith went to fetch the car. All their shit was in it anyway—they kind of needed it.

So Shiro and Keith navigated the campus by backtracking the way Ulaz took them. They walked in silence for a while, except for the music Keith put on his phone. It took away from the looming, unfamiliar dark places between the houses, and around the streets they never went down. It was warm out, and the air was an accompaniment of crickets, and the occasional breeze.

Keith had something on his mind that he couldn’t quite shake. It wasn’t like he could talk about it with everyone at the party, so he instead relayed it to Shiro. “I’m worried about the label in Lance’s shirt.”

“Why’s that?”

“I dunno. Doesn’t it worry you that his ghost shirt has _words_ on it? Like, who put them there?” Keith asked, and when Shiro shrugged, he groaned. “You aren’t _helping_.”

“Well, I don’t like to think about the afterlife too much. I mean, it’s cool to speculate, but the topic gets sort of… talked to death, I guess,” he confessed with a shrug. Keith rolled his eyes at the pun his brother made, and earned a sigh in response. “If you _really_ want an answer, you should probably check with Pidge’s idea. Put it under the microscope.”

“Come on. I feel like Heaven would be more cunning than that. They wouldn’t use stardust to make clothing if they’re gonna send it back to earth,” Keith said with a laugh. “But do you think Lance left at his own leisure? Did he know about it?”

“That depends on who the directions are for. You, or him. Because clearly you had some part in the… Bringing Back of Lance McClain, you know? Because he clearly smelled like chlorine—that’s kind of a big indicator.”

“So the instructions were for me…?” he reiterated, pressing a hand to his chest. But he didn’t _want_ Lance to go away…

“All I’m saying is that, even if Lance was in part your creation… he still had his own thoughts and feelings, you know? He was still Lance as far as I could tell,” Shiro explained. “And I feel like… we agree that you didn’t know everything _about_ Lance. So Lance was, in part, his own creation. The instructions could have been just as much for you as they were for him. You see where I’m going with this?”

“We’re talking in circles.”

“Pay _attention_ , for God’s sake,” Shiro whined, shaking Keith’s shoulder and showing just how much he drank with that single action. Keith giggled and waved his brother off. Shiro sighed a little, which just prompted Keith to jest with him a bit.

“So… where are you going with this? And by ‘this’ I mean holding hands with Ulaz in the kitchen earlier.”

He watched for Shiro’s ears to go pink, and was even more triumphant in seeing Shiro’s face go red. “I-I didn’t…? I didn’t. No.”

“You _did_ though!” Keith cooed, this time shaking Shiro’s shoulder back and forth. “Where are you going with it? Where are you going with it? Come on, come on, tell me—”

“No where! We aren’t going _anywhere_ —!” Shiro exclaimed, and Keith dissolved into giggles because—

—Ulaz would come to visit Minnesota for Christmas that year, since his family in California didn’t celebrate it. He would stay at their house for an entire week, even after Keith would go back to his own apartment. He would leave for Chicago, and then for Nashville, and return with the news that he had a job offer that would take place… in Hudson, Wisconsin. Just a drive over the Mississippi and no more than thirty minutes from Shiro’s house. It was all planned, really.

But before that happened, Shiro was in the middle of Stanford’s quad shouting, “I’m not planning anything! I’m living in the moment—I’m spon _taneous!_ ”

“You have never been spontaneous!” Keith accused, hopping onto the stone ledge of one of the palm tree arrangements. Shiro waved him off dramatically, yelling, “I am! I am spontaneous!”

Regardless of Shiro’s loud mouth and touchy-feely nature when it came to grabbing Keith by the shoulders and swinging him around, Shiro was actually good to drive. They navigated as best they could to Campus Drive where they pulled up on the side of the road and prayed to God that they wouldn’t get a parking ticket. A few girls were leaving the front porch, and they could hear one of the guys yelling, “ _Bye ladies—!_ ” with a flaunting wave of his hand, leaning sensually against the porch post. One of the girls flipped the guy off, saying, “See you around, loser!”

They navigated to the back deck where they found Hunk preparing to crash for the night. He was picking up Pidge from where she was perched on one of the outdoor couches, sleeping against the armrest. When Keith and Shiro reappeared, Hunk stopped, Pidge flopped in his arms, saying, “Whoa, where’d you guys go? You were gone for a while.”

“We went to get the car,” Keith explained. “Need help with Pidge?”

“Nah, I got her. The guys said we could crash in the living room, though, so not too far,” he explained, and led the way inside—tactfully avoiding hitting Pidge’s head on the doorframe.

Rollo brought down blankets from one of the upstairs closets, and they dispersed them amongst themselves. There were several couches to choose from, along with a sectional that Keith and Hunk claimed. They arranged themselves so their pillows linked at the corners, and if Keith craned his head back _super_ far, he could see the shape of Hunk’s face, upside down, and illuminated by his phone screen.

“What do you think of Kappa Sigma?” Keith asked, voice hushed because everyone was preparing to sleep.

Hunk shifted a little to look at Keith, and then again to his phone screen. “ _So_ cool. I’m glad we came.”

“Same.”

“I wish Lance could have come though. It was still super cool though. He would have liked it,” he said, and Keith hummed his agreement. “Isn’t it crazy though? We came all the way over here.”

“I know. And I thought word about Lance traveled fast at the _U_ ,” Keith laughed a little. Hunk laughed a little, sighing at the remembrance of it. Even if Hunk never particularly despised the attention Lance’s death brought to him, there was still some element of grief from it. Keith was starting to feel that—he didn’t become numb to it as he hoped he would. Lance’s name still smelled like chlorine, but now it came with an added sense of melancholy to it, and Keith was okay with that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This brings us to the end of _What Summer Is_! I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did writing it, and it was so fun coming up with ideas with you guys. Talk to me on [Tumblr](http://girlskylark.tumblr.com/)! I love to chat my dudes. 
> 
> In other news, I'm working on making [_The Quilted Lion_](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9483491/chapters/21458567) printable! The rough draft of the cover is hither (I'm still working on the style, but... yeah):  
> 
> 
>  
> 
> **NEW FIC:[Find The Others](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10375635/chapters/22917735) IS MY NEXT PROJECT!**


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